Dr. Shamdeo Persaud

Persons diagnosed with diabetes are being urged to seek professional medical care instead of depending on home remedies with the government saying it is spending close to GUY$300M on diabetic medicines alone.

The call came from Chief Medical officer (CMO) Dr. Shamdeo Persaud on Monday at an event in observance of World Diabetes Day.

“There are a few persons who still, even though they know they are diabetic, deny this fact or they try to apply their own measures, either local remedies or just modifications in their lifestyle. Sometimes it works sometimes it doesn’t and we’re still appealing to persons affected by this condition to seek professional medical care,” Dr. Persaud stated.

Services, he said, are available both at the public and the private sector for managing diabetes.  According to Dr. Persaud, it is estimated that some 47,000 Guyanese are living with diabetes.

“So far close to 28,000 or so access services in the public health sector for their condition and I presume a sizable proportion also access service at the private sector.”

The CMO urged that individuals with family members who have diabetes get tested since the disease is hereditary.

Monday’s event also saw the launch of a manual for teachers showing them how to help children with diabetes.

“What we found is that in addition to the family we need to look at the extended community and start building that awareness, increasing the knowledge and enhancing the skills of the staff of the Ministry of Education generally in recognising and treating with persons with diabetes,” Dr. Persaud stated.

The booklet provides some basic information on diabetes and focuses on developing the skills necessary to manage the cases. It was produced with help from the Rotary Club and PAHO.

“We hope that this manual would be made available to all the teachers even though we know that there might not be lots of kids in each classroom with diabetes but we think that every teacher should have some basic knowledge on diabetes,” he said.  

Type 1 diabetes can affect both children and adults but has traditionally been linked more with children while type 2, which is due primarily to lifestyle factors and genetics, is found mostly in adults.  

Health Minister Dr. Leslie Ramsammy in a statement released to the media said Guyana already spends almost $300M on diabetes medicine alone in the public sector.

“When we add the private sector, medicines alone account for more than $400M on an annual basis,” he stated.

According to Dr. Ramsammy, action must be taken now to reduce the almost 800 premature deaths that occur in Guyana each year because of diabetes.