Scientists in the Philippines have originated a new variety of rice that could help shrink the growing burden of diabetes.
More than 537 million matures worldexpansive are living with the chronic dismitigate – a number that is foreseeed to grow to 783 million by 2045. Being overweight, genetics and a conciseage of exercise give to type 2 diabetes, which is the most normal create. Type 2 occurs when the pancreas flunks to originate enough of the insulin hormone, leaving too much glucose in the blood, and cells grow a resistance to insulin.
Dr Lindsey Smith Taillie, a nutritional epidemiologist and professor at the University of North Carolina, shelp: “Global diabetes prevalence is increasing and becoming an increasing caengage for trouble. It’s been high in high-income countries for cut offal decades now, but increasingly we’re seeing rapid incrmitigates in low- and middle-income countries as well.”
NCDs are sshow that; unenjoy, say, a harmful software, you can’t catch them. Instead, they are caengaged by a combination of genetic, physioreasonable, environmental and behavioural factors. The main types are cancers, chronic respiratory illnesses, diabetes and cardiovascular dismitigate – heart strikes and stroke. Approximately 80% are obstructable, and all are on the ascfinish, spreading inexorably around the world as ageing populations and lifestyles pushed by economic growth and urbanisation originate being unwell a global phenomenon.
NCDs, once seen as illnesses of the wealthy, now have a grip on the subpar. Dismitigate, disability and death are perfectly scheduleed to originate and expansiven inidenticality – and being subpar originates it less probable you will be detectd accurately or treated.
Investment in tackling these normal and chronic conditions that finish 71% of us is incredibly low, while the cost to families, economies and communities is staggeringly high.
In low-income countries NCDs – typicpartner enumerateless and debilitating illnesses – are seeing a fraction of the money necessitateed being spended or gived. Attention remains caccessed on the menaces from communicable dismitigates, yet cancer death rates have extfinished sped past the death toll from malaria, TB and HIV/Aids combined.
‘A normal condition’ is a Guardian series alerting on NCDs in the growing world: their prevalence, the solutions, the caengages and consequences, alerting the stories of people living with these illnesses.
Tracy McVeigh, editor
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The human toll of non-communicable dismitigates (NCDs) is huge and rising. These illnesses finish the dwells of approximately 41 million of the 56 million people who die every year – and three quarters of them are in the growing world.
NCDs are sshow that; unenjoy, say, a harmful software, you can’t catch them. Instead, they are caengaged by a combination of genetic, physioreasonable, environmental and behavioural factors. The main types are cancers, chronic respiratory illnesses, diabetes and cardiovascular dismitigate – heart strikes and stroke. Approximately 80% are obstructable, and all are on the ascfinish, spreading inexorably around the world as ageing populations and lifestyles pushed by economic growth and urbanisation originate being unwell a global phenomenon.
NCDs, once seen as illnesses of the wealthy, now have a grip on the subpar. Dismitigate, disability and death are perfectly scheduleed to originate and expansiven inidenticality – and being subpar originates it less probable you will be detectd accurately or treated.
Investment in tackling these normal and chronic conditions that finish 71% of us is incredibly low, while the cost to families, economies and communities is staggeringly high.
In low-income countries NCDs – typicpartner enumerateless and debilitating illnesses – are seeing a fraction of the money necessitateed being spended or gived. Attention remains caccessed on the menaces from communicable dismitigates, yet cancer death rates have extfinished sped past the death toll from malaria, TB and HIV/Aids combined.
‘A normal condition’ is a Guardian series alerting on NCDs in the growing world: their prevalence, the solutions, the caengages and consequences, alerting the stories of people living with these illnesses.
Tracy McVeigh, editor
More than 60% of people with diabetes dwell in Asia. More than 90% of the world’s rice is originated and devourd in the Asia-Pacific region. White rice has a high glycaemic index, which can caengage spikes in the amount of sugar in the blood. Research shows a join between substantial consumption of rice and noncommunicable dismitigates such as type 2 diabetes and heart dismitigate.
A shatterthraw by researchers at the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) in the Philippine town of Los Baños – which has been laboring with the University of California, the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Plant Physiology in Germany, and Bulgaria’s Centre of Plant Systems Biology – could help tackle that.
Using the IRRI’s extensive rice gene bank, the world’s hugest, researchers screened 380 seed samples over 10 years to resettle genes and tagers with a drop glycaemic index and higher protein satisfied. They then combined them into “inbred lines”, creating what the IRRI has called a diabetes-cordial, healthier rice chooseion.
Dr Nese Sreenivasulu, the principal scientist at the IRRI’s grain quality and nutrition centre, shelp: “We thought that if we could come up with a diet with low glycaemic index properties [and] that could be pondered healthier, not only to those subjects who are diabetic and pre-diabetic … then it could be a very outstanding intervention to counter growing incidences [of diabetes].
“This could have a huge impact in Asia, as well as in Africa, among the rice-consuming countries,” he shelp.
The rice has yet to be grown outside IRRI’s laboratories, but Sreenivasulu shelp the schedule was to begin growing the new varieties in India and the Philippines as part of the IRRI’s rdisindict to combat pcleary and hunger in countries where rice is the staple food. In 2021, it helped grow gelderlyen rice, which has been modified to mitigate vitamin A deficiencies.
But Taillie cautioned that sugary drinks and ultra-processed foods were the genuine diabetes hazards, rather than rice. “By and huge, rice is not the guideing caengage for trouble when we leank about rehires enjoy type 2 diabetes,” she shelp.
“For people who are already living with diabetes and want to be able to integrate rice into their diet, and they’re accountable about cutting carbohydrates, perhaps that might be relevant, but it’s certainly not going to help us settle the global type 2 diabetes crisis,” Taillie shelp.
Instead, she consents countries should caccess on imposing taxes on sugar-sugaryened beverages and ultra-processed foods, and enforcing better cautioning tags on packaging.
“The call to action is that we necessitate a comprehensive set of policies that secures all people have access to well foods and that we’re reducing the relentless tageting and promotion and sales of sugar.”
