Diabetes Dragging Down America's Health: Reports

Increasingly, young people are suffering from the obesity-linked illness

By Steven Reinberg and E.J. Mundell
HealthDay Reporters

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THURSDAY, Nov. 16 (HealthDay News) -- Half of the estimated 21 million adult Americans with diabetes now rate themselves as having only "fair" or "poor" health, and people between 18 and 44 years of age are increasingly affected, a new report from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention finds.

In fact, people with diabetes are three times more likely than others to say their health is flagging, the CDC report found.

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The news is troubling because "fair or poor health among persons with diabetes is also associated with the presence of diabetes-related complications such as lower extremity amputation, blindness, kidney failure, and cardiovascular disease," noted the editors of the CDC journal Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, which will publish the findings Friday.

In the study, CDC researchers looked over 2005 data from the federal Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, an ongoing survey of adult Americans' health and health risk factors. Among the poll's questions: "Would you say that, in general, your health is excellent, very good, good, fair, or poor?"

According to the survey, almost half (49.3 percent) of those with diabetes said they were only in "fair" or "poor" health -- a number three times higher than that of people without diabetes.

The rate of fair/poor health among people 45 and older with diabetes has remained stable over the past 10 years, hovering around 50 percent. But the CDC noted that health complaints are rising among younger Americans. Among people with diabetes aged 18 to 44, reports of fair/poor health rose from about 36 percent in 1996 to 43.4 percent by 2005, the researchers found.

Race and availability of insurance were also key to health. Hispanic Americans, especially, are 60 percent more likely than whites to note poor health linked to diabetes, and a lack of health insurance boosted the likelihood of poorer health by 70 percent, the study found.

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