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India’s Diabetes Crisis Skews Younger as New Data Exposes Detection Gaps

New surveys with clinical reports highlight rising risk in under-40s, prompting earlier screening.

Overview

  • ICICI Lombard’s 2025 India Wellness Index finds 17% of respondents reporting diabetes, a flat national wellness score for the fourth year, and Gen Z showing the steepest declines in well-being.
  • Mahajan Imaging & Labs reports abnormal metabolic results in under-40 adults—38% fasting glucose, 20% HbA1c, 35% post‑prandial—supporting expert calls for annual metabolic screening from age 25.
  • BMC data show only 27% awareness of excess sugar risks, 15.6% prediabetes in a 5,000-person survey, and 5,59,751 screenings over three years, with clinicians noting roughly half of cases go undiagnosed until complications.
  • Hospitals and NGOs report integrated-care gains: OGH’s diabetic foot clinic has provided protective footwear to about 200 patients, NIMS has supplied 125 insulin pumps under Aarogyasri, and Hinduja Foundation’s T1D initiative has improved HbA1c from 10.4% to 7.8% for over 1,000 children.
  • Clinicians warn diagnosis is increasingly occurring in teens and twenty-somethings in a country with more than 100 million people living with diabetes, citing lifestyle stressors and pollution as compounding risks alongside genetics.