Health: Diabetes

Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean Excerpts

Tuesday 1st November 2011 Lords Chamber

[Earl Howe]

I shall certainly do so. In relation to insulin pumps, we know that more has to be done to increase the uptake, in line with NICE recommendations. The current operating framework highlights the need to do more to make these devices available. Bariatric surgery should be seen as a last resort, but in some cases it is the right option. It is not an easy option because surgery comes with risks, and anyone undergoing it needs to make significant lifestyle changes. But I am sure that my noble friend’s messages are well taken in the medical community.

[Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean]

My Lords, can the Minister tell us, given that there has been an extraordinary increase in the number of people suffering from diabetes in the past few years, how much of the increase is due to improved diagnosis of people who had diabetes and simply did not know that they had it?

[Earl Howe]

Certainly, we are picking up more cases of diabetes than we might have done in the past, but my advice is that approximately half the increase that we have seen is due to the changing age and ethnic group structure of the population and half due to higher levels of obesity.