Call for free insulin pumps in fight against diabetes

The Malta Diabetes Association is to lobby the government to provide free insulin pumps to diabetics, it was revealed yesterday.

The pumps offer an alternative to daily insulin injections and would improve the quality of life for patients.

They would help to control the disease better and avoid complications that result in huge healthcare costs for the government, said the association’s president Anna Zammit McKeon.

An insulin pump is a small, computerised device attached to the abdomen area that releases insulin into the body. The flow of insulin can be changed to match food intake and correct high blood sugar.

Although pumps are available privately in Malta, getting one is complicated because the structures are still lacking.

Speaking during a national seminar on diabetes, Ms Zammit McKeon said the association had been working to increase the number of syringes (currently 10 per month) and the number of glucose testing strips (50 per month) provided free by the government to each diabetes patient.

She said the association had also been pressuring the government to pay for operations, such as kidney transplants, that had to be carried out abroad.

Ms Zammit McKeon said that World Diabetes Day, marked tomorrow, was a time to remember the effects of the disease that led to various complications including heart disease, amputations and depression.

Prof. Stephen Fava, who heads the Diabetes and Endocrine Centre at Mater Dei Hospital, said that almost 80 per cent of men and 95 per cent of women who visit the centre are centrally obese.

This highlighted the need to work on the prevention of the disease through lifestyle changes, he said.

The incidence of diabetes is on the increase worldwide with Type 2 diabetes, linked to obesity and unhealthy lifestyles, making up some 90 per cent of cases.

A European health survey released last year showed that 58 per cent of Maltese adults are obese or overweight.

In Malta, the incidence of diabetes is very high at 11.8 per cent of the population compared with 8.8 per cent in Italy, 9.5 per cent in Greece and 7.8 per cent in the UK, the professor said.

Diabetes affects about 246 million people worldwide. It is a chronic disease that occurs either when the pancreas does not produce enough insulin, a hormone that regulates blood sugar, or when the body cannot effectively use the insulin it produces.

Parent support

It is estimated that 15.6 children out of every 100,000 in Malta suffer from Type 1 diabetes and Type 2 is on the increase.

The Malta Diabetes Association has set up a support group for parents whose children have diabetes with the aim to provide a space where parents can share experiences.

These parents also have to learn to give their children sugar in cases of a drastic drop in blood sugar levels, and learn how to deal with hypoglycaemia, where the level of blood glucose drops leading to a number of symptoms such as dizziness, sweating and shaking.

www.diabetesmalta.org