There is a rapid increase in the prevalence of type 2 diabetes in Asian countries. It is estimated that India and China will remain the two countries with the highest number of people with diabetes (79.4 million and 42.3 million, respectively) by 2030. Asian populations are more insulin resistant than are people of many other races. Moreover, insulin resistance is also observed in children and adolescent of Asian Indian origin. These factors probably explain an important part of the rapidly emerging diabetes epidemic in young and older populations in Asia. In addition, type 2 diabetes has a strong genetic component and several variants associated with type 2 diabetes have been identified in Asian populations. The increasing rate of diabetes in Asia is associated with a strong gene-environmental interaction, which is driven by lifestyle changes caused by modernisation. Abdominal obesity is also a characteristic feature in many Asian populations and could also be linked to the high prevalence of type 2 diabetes. Thus, this major problem calls for important actions to raise public awareness, initiate national programs for prevention and improve management of type 2 diabetes which has been recognised as a serious epidemic by a UN resolution.
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