COVID-19 also appear to experience higher rates of diabetes, according to new research.
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The study Trusted Source, which was published in The Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology Monday, found that people who recovered from COVID-19 had a 40 percent greater risk of being diagnosed with diabetes.
The report does not claim that COVID-19 causes diabetes — although that may ultimately be the case — but rather that there appears to be an associated link between the two health conditions.
Why that happens is still unclear.
The study evaluated the health records of 181,280 the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs patients diagnosed with COVID between March 1, 2020, and September 30, 2021.
Their medical records were then compared to those of 4.1 million VA patients who did not have COVID and another 4.28 million patients treated between 2018 and 2019.
The research team found that those who had COVID-19 faced a 40 percent greater risk of being diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes and were at a greater risk of being prescribed medication to help manage their blood sugar levels.
Though the risk of diabetes was greater in individuals, who experienced more severe illness with COVID-19, the heightened risk of diabetes was present in patients who had milder cases, too.
The vast majority of patients who were diagnosed with diabetes after recovering from COVID-19 had Type 2 diabetes, not Type 1 diabetes.
Furthermore, patients at low risk of diabetes before the pandemic also appeared to have an increased risk of diabetes after COVID-19.
Glycometabolic abnormalities have previously been reported in patients actively experiencing SARS-CoV-2.
According to the researchers, Type 2 diabetes may potentially be a component of long COVID — a post-infection condition that causes lingering symptoms and health issues.
It’s worth noting that there are limitations to the study, including that the cohort was predominantly made up of older white males, and the findings will need to be confirmed through additional research. ■