Karachi: As many as 10 per cent people are suffering from diabetes in Pakistan, revealed Dr. M. Hafiz-ur-Rahman, Assistant Professor of Dr. Panjwani Centre for Molecular Medicine and Drug Research (PCMD) – Karachi University (KU) on Saturday.
While delivering a lecture on “Diabetes: Prevention and Management through Natural Life Style” at the video conferencing hall of Latif Ebrahim Jamal (LEJ) National Science Information Centre, he said that diabetes was one of the most challenging public health problems of the 21st century and leading cause for morbidity and mortality all over the world. The world prevalence of diabetes among adults was 8.3 percent, affecting 366 million adults in 2011 and would increase to 9.9 percent and affect 552 million adults by 2030, he added. “Natural products have been the source of medicinal agents since earliest times.”
The lecture was jointly organised by Dr. Panjwani Centre for Molecular Medicine and Drug Research and Virtual Education Project Pakistan (VEPP) as a part of series of popular lectures for public awareness on common diseases of Pakistan. Health professionals, students, research scholars, NGO representatives and general public attended the lecture.
Dr. Rahman said Asia was the epicentres of diabetes and home about of 60 percent of the world’s diabetic population. “This epidemic is driven by consumption of more carbohydrates, lack of exercise, stomach full eating, eating at irregular hour, intake of fatty and junk foods, rapid urbanization, mechanization, computerization, nutritional transition, late night eating, late night sleeping, more television watching, maternal hyperglycemia, maternal undernutrition, malnutrition, depression and environmental pollutants.
“This large number of diabetic subjects of Pakistan gradually loses their efficiency and potency, causes direct and indirect burden to the family, to the society and ultimately to the country. Prevention and control of diabetes is a key issue because of the huge premature morbidity and mortality associated with diabetes,” he said.
Talking about the role of natural products in the primary health care, he said that natural products have been the source of medicinal agents since earliest times, and today they continue to play a dominant role in the primary health care of about 80 percent of the world’s population.
Natural products, and medicinal agents derived from natural products are also an essential feature in the healthcare systems of the remaining 20 percent of the population of developed countries. He said, “Natural products once served as the source of all drugs and even today more than 25 percent of all drugs in clinical use having a natural product origin.”
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