About Diabetes

What is Diabetes?

Diabetes is a chronic condition that occurs when the amount of glucose (sugar) is too high in your blood. When your blood sugar goes up, your body responds by releasing insulin from your pancreas. Insulin allows your body’s cells to take up the sugar in your blood and use it for energy.

If you have diabetes, your body either doesn’t make enough insulin or stops responding to the insulin that is released.

Over time high levels of blood sugar can cause chronic health problems.

Prediabetes is a condition that is characterized by higher-than-normal blood sugar levels that have not become high enough to be diagnosed with diabetes. Prediabetes happens when your body either doesn’t produce enough insulin or has problems using the insulin that is produced.

Progression from prediabetes to diabetes can be slowed, or even reversed, with lifestyle changes such as weight loss, dietary changes and exercise.

Type 1 Diabetes

Type 1 diabetes is a condition where your pancreas produces little or no insulin. Type 1 diabetes was once known as juvenile or insulin-dependent diabetes.

The exact cause of type 1 diabetes is not known, but it has been possibly associated with the body’s immune system mistakenly destroying the part of the pancreas responsible for producing insulin.

Despite continued research, a cure for type 1 diabetes is not known. The mainstay of treatment is insulin injections to control blood sugar

Type 2 Diabetes

Type 2 diabetes is a condition in which your body does not produce enough insulin or becomes resistant to the insulin produced. This is the most common form of diabetes affecting more than 38 million Americans.

There is no cure for type 2 diabetes but lifestyle changes such as eating well, exercising and weight loss can help control the condition. When lifestyle changes are not enough there are medications that can help control blood sugar.

Statistics:

NATIONAL DATA
(According to 2021 Data from the CDC):

1.2 million new cases of diabetes—or 5.9 per 1,000 people—were diagnosed in 2021
38.4 million people of all ages – or 11.6% of the U.S. population – had diabetes
In 2021, there were about almost 8.4 million individuals worldwide with type 1 diabetes
8th leading cause of death
An estimated 97.6 million adults aged 18 years or older had prediabetes in 2021

PENNSYLVANIA DATA
(According to data reported in 2023):

Approximately 1,162,598 people in Pennsylvania, or 11.3% of the adult population, have diagnosed diabetes.
An additional 303,000 people in Pennsylvania have diabetes but don’t know it, greatly increasing their health risk.
Diagnosed diabetes costs an estimated $12.9 billion in Pennsylvania each year. The serious complications include heart disease, stroke, amputation, end-stage kidney disease, blindness—and death.
There are 3,484,000 people in Pennsylvania, 34.1% of the adult population, who have prediabetes.
Every year an estimated 76,535 people in Pennsylvania are diagnosed with diabetes.

YORK COUNTY DATA:

35,229 people were diagnosed with diabetes in 2021
2,652 new cases of diabetes were diagnosed in 2019
154 people died from Diabetes Mellitus in 2022

Data gathered from the American Diabetes Association (ADA), PA Department of Health
and the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC)

Fast Facts about Diabetes

Diabetes is a chronic disease or a disorder that occurs when the blood sugar levels in your body are too high.