China's healthcare system might break down from the surge of diabetics in the country. (Photo : Getty Images)
After being deemed as one of the country's fastest growing health problem, the looming threat that diabetes poses in China can also take down the nation's entire healthcare system.
According to Quartz, the sudden and continuous increase in diabetes patients in China can become the country's doom in terms of national healthcare.
This report comes a little less than a month after the World Bank criticized the country's healthcare system for being inefficient as healthcare becomes more expensive in China, CNBC reported in July.
Diabetes in China
A report from the South China Morning Post published in April revealed how diabetes has rapidly conquered the country after the number of diabetic patients increased nine-fold in one generation.
In the report, the rise of diabetes in China is being attributed to unhealthy lifestyle brought about by economic development and the increasing elderly population of the nation.
Apparently, China had a lot less diabetics during the 1980s when only less than 1 percent of the Chinese population had the chronic disease.
After a generation has passed, the country as developed a liking for sweets which led to the sudden prevalence of the disease which a recent study published in PLOS Journal linked to cardiovascular diseases.
According to the study, "diabetes now accounts for almost 0.5 million cardiovascular disease deaths each year in China; this disease burden will likely increase as diabetes is expected to become more prevalent in China over coming decades, especially among young adults."
China's Healthcare System
Because of diabetes as well as the increasing elderly population of China, the World Bank decided to release a report on how the nation should spend on their healthcare system.
Cited by the CNBC, the World Bank urged the Chinese government to implement a reform in the healthcare system that is "more people-oriented."
Without this, China's expenses in health will only increase to without actually being effective in providing quality healthcare for its people.
"Business as usual, without reform, would result in growth of total health expenditure from 5.6 percent of GDP in 2015 to 9.1 percent in 2035, an average increase of 8.4 percent per year in real terms," the World Bank report stated.
Now, the World Health Organization is beginning to worry that China's healthcare system will get overwhelmed especially with the increasing number of diabetes in the country.
"If we don't act now diabetes will overwhelm the health system," WHO China representative Bernhard Schwartländer told Quartz.
So far, China only has education and awareness projects that have yet to be supported by concrete plans to help ease the burden brought about by the "tsunami" of diabetic patients in Chinese healthcare facilities even after seeing an epidemic of the chronic disease.
