Novo Nordisk opens diabetes clinic for kids
Novo Nordisk, a global leader in diabetes care, yesterday opened a clinic in Dhaka for children with type-1 diabetes to provide free insulin and education to the diabetes-affected children.
The clinic was launched at BIRDEM-2 at Segunbagicha under the Changing Diabetes in Children (CDiC) programme of Novo Nordisk.
Crown Prince of Denmark Frederik inaugurated the clinic, the company's largest. It set up similar clinics in several other countries.
Affected children with type-1 diabetes need to take insulin for survival.
Danish Ambassador Svend Olling, President of Diabetic Association of Bangladesh (BADAS) Prof Azad Khan and Senior Vice President of Novo Nordisk's International Operations Jesper Høiland were also present on the occasion.
"We don't want any children to die without insulin," said Høiland at a briefing after the launch.
This is one of the three clinics for diabetes affected children in Bangladesh. The company also runs the CDiC programme in eight other developing countries to give health care to 10,000 children by this year.
The clinic was launched in partnership with BADAS and World Diabetes Foundation.
A total of 1,100 children have already enrolled and the number will rise to 1,500 by the
year-end.
The incidence of type-1 diabetes among children is rising in the world, and 330 million people are suffering from diabetes. Of them, 200 million are from the developing countries.
The number of children suffering from type-1 diabetes in the world is 440,000. More than half of them live in the developing countries.
In Bangladesh, 8.4 million people suffer from diabetes. Incidence of type-1 diabetes between 0-14 years age group is 4.2 percent in every 100,000 children, according to International Diabetes Federation (IDF).
Høiland said one of the main reasons for diabetes is changes in lifestyle. He said the increased incidence has created concerns of pandemic in the world.
"One out of 10 adults is going to be diabetes affected in the next 20 years," said the official of Novo Nordisk.
"For all of us, awareness and education on diabetes is very important," said Prof Azad Khan, president of BADAS.
He blamed obesity, eating too much fast food and a lack of walking space in the towns and cities for high prevalence of disease in Bangladesh.
He said, of the three types of diabetes, insulin is a must for people or children who have type-1 diabetes. This type of diabetes is rising in Bangladesh, said Khan.
He said BADAS has the biggest network in the world. But the association is yet to reach 75 percent of diabetes patients.
Awareness is important to fight the disease, he said, adding that type-2 diabetes is largely preventable.
Høiland said a well designed education programme for the patients will help them better lives and become engaged in productive activities.
The new clinic, which will handle 1,000 children a month, will not only provide free insulin, syringe and glucometer but also offer training on diabetes among health care professionals on the specificities of diabetes in children.
Education to patients and their parents will also be provided to enable them manage diabetes.
Høiland said Novo Nordisk has been working in partnership with the diabetic association for a long time and will continue collaborating with efforts to fight diabetes.
On the clinic, he said, "We will evaluate the programme on how we can expand."
The two other CDiC clinics are in Chittagong and Faridpur.
Headquartered in Denmark, the 88-year-old Novo Nordisk markets its products in 179 countries. The company had formed a tie-up with a leading local pharma firm Eskayef to extend its manufacturing base to Bangladesh as the third destination in Asia after China and India.
The Nordisk-Eskayef plant was opened in December 2010 to manufacture more than five million vials a year, maintaining the high quality standards followed by Novo Nordisk across the world. Transcom is the authorised distributor of Novo Nordisk products in
Bangladesh.
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