In 2014, there was only one place where the roughly 40,000 residents of Comoros, an archipelago of volcanic islands situated off the southeastern coast of Africa, could receive diabetes care - the National Hospital, El-Maarouf on the island of Mohéli.
WDF’s first new partnerships of 2021 are a wide-ranging and ambitious group. Two address the urgent global issues of COVID-19 and humanitarian crises. Some, such as the project in Lesotho, mark the Foundation’s first partnership in the country , while others, such as the Phase II project in Palestine, build on long-term relationships and learnings.
Still other projects, in Canada and India, represent innovative new approaches to diabetes prevention and financing for diabetes care.
The Diabetes Storytelling Lab is looking for 50 innovative storytellers and community leaders in India to develop creative communication products that can support diabetes awareness in India.
The World Diabetes Foundation (WDF) and the Danish Red Cross (DRC) began collaborating in 2013, with a diabetes prevention project in rural Georgia. A second diabetes prevention and care project followed in Armenia in 2016. Then, just last month, a new joint project in Lebanon received funding from the Novo Nordisk Foundation, providing a much-needed investment into that country’s health system.
More than 350 million people in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) live with diabetes. 77% of these do not receive adequate care. The rise in people living with diabetes is putting immense pressure on healthcare professionals (HCPs) and healthcare systems where resources are scarce.
With a timely diagnosis and proper treatment, diabetes is typically a manageable disease. Yet many HCPs in LMICs lack sufficient skills and resources to prevent, diagnose and treat diabetes.
Marginalised, vulnerable and underserved populations in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) continue to be hardest hit by diabetes and its complications. Yet responses remain under-resourced, both from domestic resources and development assistance.
Diabetes and its complications are a serious burden for Indigenous communities in Canada. To address this, the Raven Indigenous Impact Foundation (RIIF) today announced plans to create a Diabetes Reduction Bond – an innovative model for designing and financing diabetes interventions in Canada and around the world.
The project is supported by a $506,000 (USD) grant from the World Diabetes Foundation.
The end of 2020 will not likely be remembered for much good news. But in the fall, an encouraging article appeared in the American Journal of Applied Psychology. A team of educators and public health experts in Mexico had successfully improved the ability of teachers, students and parents to improve healthy habits relating to diet and exercise.
The article explored the impact of a project designed by Martha Givaudan and her team at Instituto Mexicano de Investigación de Familia y Población A.C. (IMIFAP) and supported by WDF.
Guatemala’s Sololá region, with its sparkling lake ringed by volcanoes, is exceptionally beautiful. But a hidden danger stalks the Maya people who live there.
Glucose tests conducted by Hospitalito Atitlán, WDF’s partner in the region, found that 15% of people tested had diabetes and 11% were pre-diabetic. More than 23% of the hospital’s patients are obese, and 43% are overweight.
WDF funded a total of 11 new projects in the second half of 2020, many in Africa but also spanning the rest of the world.
Several of the new projects build on previous projects, for example by extending Armenia’s national diabetes strategy and improving access to diabetes care and prevention in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. In Mozambique, a new project aims to ensure that the results obtained during the first phase are not eroded because of the current COVID-19 emergency. Two more projects, in Mongolia and Uganda, are working with different NCD management models.