Type 2 diabetes rate dramatically increases

Nearly 4.5% of all people in the Netherlands have been diagnosed diabetes, up from 2.5% in 2002. The large increase is due to a spike in the rate of people with type two diabetes, Statistics Netherlands reported this week.

Roughly 3.8% of the country has type two diabetes, often caused by obesity and little physical activity leading to either a drop in the amount of insulin produced by the pancreas, or a resistance to insulin.

At 0.7% of the population, the rate of type one diabetes has stayed relatively flat over the 12-year period, declining from a 2010 peak of nearly one percent.

Doctors diagnose type one diabetes when a patient’s own immune system attacks the cells in the pancreas responsible for insulin production.

Diabetes affects 750,000 patients across the country. Type two diabetes is five times more common than type one. Almost 16 percent of people with diabetes are overweight, and seven percent are somewhat overweight.

The rate of diabetes also increases dramatically as age increases. Over 17 percent of people in the Netherlands over 75 have diabetes, compared to fewer than three percent of people between 40 and 50 years old.

Today is World Diabetes Day, which aims to raise awareness and to inform people on how to prevent it through a healthy lifestyle.