Diabetes is a chronic, metabolic disease characterized by elevated levels of blood glucose (or blood sugar), which leads over time to serious damage to the heart, blood vessels, eyes, kidneys and nerves.  It is associated with an absolute or relative deficiency in the secretion and/or action of insulin. It leads over time to serious damage to the heart, blood vessels, eyes, kidneys and nerves. 

There are three main forms of diabetes. Type 2 is the most common, representing 85-90% of all cases, usually in adults, which occurs when the body becomes resistant to insulin or doesn’t make enough insulin. In the past three decades, the prevalence of type 2 diabetes has risen dramatically in countries of all income levels, linked to modifiable factors such as obesity and overweight, physical inactivity and high calories, low nutritional value diets. Type 1 diabetes, once known as juvenile diabetes or insulin-dependent diabetes, is a chronic condition in which the pancreas produces little or no insulin by itself. Gestational diabetes is hyperglycaemia with blood glucose values above normal but below those diagnostic of diabetes, occurring during pregnancy.  For people living with diabetes, access to affordable treatment, including insulin, is critical to their survival. 

Impaired glucose tolerance (IGT) and impaired fasting glycaemia (IFG) are intermediate conditions in the transition between normality and diabetes. People with IGT or IFG are at high risk of progressing to type 2 diabetes, although this is not inevitable.

It is estimated that about 62 million people in the Americas live with type 2 diabetes. Both the number of cases and the prevalence of diabetes have risen steadily over the past decades. There is a globally agreed target to halt the rise in diabetes and obesity by 2025.

Source: PAHO/WHO