The Diabetes Association of Nigeria says no about 11.2 million Nigerians are presently living with the disease.

President of the association, Dr Alkali Mohammed, made the disclosure on Monday in Abuja at an event to commemorate the 2023 World Diabetes Day.

The WDD is a day set aside by the United Nations to draw public attention to the need for action to fight the menace of diabetes.

It is a day also designed to raise awareness about the disease as a global public health issue and what should be done collectively and individually to manage of the condition or prevent it

The 2023 commemoration has as its theme, “Access to diabetes care.”

Mr Mohammed explained that out of the 11.2 million Nigerians living with diabetes, 90 per cent of them had type 2, adding that the disease could affect any part of the body.

He also disclosed that about 537 million people were recorded living with the disease globally.

He added that it had been projected that the figure could increase to 737 million by 2040 if nothing was done to curb the disease.

Mr Mohammed, however, advocated increased tax on sugar-sweetened beverages products from 10 per cent to 20, noting that the tax would improve the health culture and environment by discouraging the consumption of sugary products.

He also said that the tax would help raise some revenue for the government.

The president, however, said that the government had not been able to explain what the 10 per cent tax from SSBs was being used for.

“The government does not fund the control and management of non-communicable diseases including diabetes due to what it termed as paucity of funds,” he said.

He, therefore, appealed to the government to use at least 60 per cent of the tax generated for public enlightenment, prevention, as well as subsidising of drugs, especially for diabetes patients.

Mr Mohammed also called for enrolment of some Nigerians into NCDs in the health insurance scheme.

Meanwhile, a group, the National Action on Sugar Reduction has said that a diabetic patient spends not less than N300, 000 annually on medication.

Chairman of the group, Dr Alhassan-Adamu Umar, said that diabetes indirectly costs Nigeria about 4.5 billion dollars yearly.

The coalition, however, said that there was a need for Nigeria as a country to take proper action to curtail the risk posed by NCDs from the consumption of SSBs.

“In Nigeria, most of the payment we make for healthcare is out of pocket payment, so if you add the total costs of all the complications that affect any part of the body, together with cost of living, it is a huge cost.

“The second component is the fact that people become less productive when they lose their eyesight or when they are sick, they don’t go to work.

“If the head of the family or the mother is diabetic, and she cannot see, some members of the family that could have been productive elsewhere would be tied down to supporting them.

“You can see that this sickness has a multi-factorial component on the family at large, and the amount you envisage you will spend on the sickness could be more than that,” he said.

Mr Umar also said that Nigeria had the highest burden of diabetes in Africa.

According to him, diabetes is under-reported and some people are living with the disease without knowing they have it, so the number we have today may be more because some people don’t know they are living with the disease.

“An event like this is an eye opener for policy-makers to do the needful and increase awareness on what we eat, drink, and to reduce the burden of NCDs, especially diabetes which has a lot to do with our lifestyles.

“We want proper implementation of policy, proper usage of the tax deduction from SSBs product for betterment of the lives of diabetic patients,” he said.

The coalition is a group of health organisations advocating for policy to curtail the consumption of SSBs linked to non-communicable diseases such as type 2 diabetes, cancer, and hypertension.

 (NAN)