50,000 Belizeans have diabetes; most don’t know it
If you’re just finishing off dinner and contemplating dessert, here’s some food for thought. It is now estimated that as much as fifty thousand Belizeans have diabetes and most of them don’t even know it. This Wednesday has been slated as World Diabetes Day and the Belize Diabetes Association is getting a head start on the activities to promote awareness on the deadly disease. President of B.D.A., Beth McBride, says we should all adopt healthy lifestyles.
Jacqueline Woods
We do not know just how many people are living with diabetes in Belize, but the Belize Diabetes Association believes that as much as twenty percent of our population, or fifty thousand people, may have the disease or are at risk of getting it.
Beth McBride, President, Belize Diabetes Assoc.
“We have people of African descent, people of Hispanic descent and we have native Indians, and all three of those groups are at high risk for diabetes, just because of their ethnic background. And then culturally, we have the foods we eat, the lack of exercise, more people driving instead of walking. And when you walk on our streets, what you see is people with large bellies, so that’s something we really have to work on, starting with the kids.”
This week a number of activities will take place to commemorate World Diabetes Day, which will be observed on Wednesday, November fourteenth. This year, it is not only diabetics who are being encouraged to live a healthy lifestyle. It is believed that few Belizeans realise that there is a link between diabetes and cardiovascular disease.
Beth McBride
“Diabetese and Cardiovascular Disease – Take It To Heart” was chosen because every year we select a certain aspect of diabetes management to focus on. And there is a lot of people having heart attacks and amputations because of cardiovascular disease, so today we are bringing the attention to that.”
Jacqueline Woods
“I can tell you, living with diabetes for the past seven years has not been easy. Once diagnosed, the patient must take definite steps to change their lifestyle in order to properly manage the disease.”
Beth McBride
“It’s not as easy as it sounds as anybody with diabetes can attest to. We have to make a conscious choice to live and to live healthy and the way we can do that is by balancing the medication we get from the physician with what we eat and with what exercise we do.”
It would also help if restaurants and other food outlets would start to offer a wider choice of healthy entrees. Unfortunately, the cost of medication in Belize is also a significant factor for the life of a diabetic. Reporting for News 5, Jacqueline Woods.
If you would like more information about diabetes, the Association will be hosting a clinic, complete with free blood glucose tests, at the B. D. A. headquarters on Wilson Street in the Helpage Complex in Belize City. Similar clinics will also be conducted countrywide.
