Published in News
Fifteen investigator teams from Rwanda to Fiji are meeting in Cape Town (13-15 November) to learn lessons from their respective studies based across all four continents.
The teams are funded by the Global Alliance for Chronic diseases, (GACD) an alliance of 8 of the world’s largest public health research funders. Hosted by the South African Medical Research Council, the groups are sharing experiences on working in developing settings on Hypertension research projects, including Mhealth, behaviour change and salt reduction.
Key to translating that knowledge is how current GACD approaches to hypertension care can be passed on to help the launch of the next research call into diabetes prevention.
Dr Johan Louw, GACD Management Committee member from South Africa’s Medical Research Council thinks that an allied approach is key. “It’s vital that we stem the tide of the diabetes tsunami and the GACD’S next call for funding will be key to this. We will focus specifically on the prevention of diabetes and how the data generated will lead to policy changes on a global scale.”
Current GACD chair Dr. Susan Shurin welcomed the teams on video by stressing the importance of a global approach to non-communicable diseases. “The whole is really greater than the sum of its parts. We are looking to you to collaborate, standardise some of the approaches that you do and really enable us as a group to go to the leaders of nations to say if you make an investment in these things, your country will be stronger, healthier, more economically viable and contribute to our ability to maintain peace in the world.”
According to the International Diabetes Federation, one in ten of the world’s population will have diabetes by 2035. People living with diabetes will surge from 382 million to 592 million people by 2035. The majority of those will live in low-and middle-income countries and most of them will be under 60 years of age.