Group items tagged

Asia is in the grip of a diabetes epidemic. In human and financial terms, the burden is huge and it is hitting the poor especially hard. Often thought of as a disease of the rich, experts say the unabating rise may be fuelled as much by food scarcity and insecurity as it is by excess. Changing lifestyles, rapid urbanisation and cheap calories in the form of processed foods are putting more and more people at risk of developing Type-2 diabetes. There are now 382 million people worldwide living with diabetes, according to new figures from the International Diabetes Federation (IDF). More than half are in Asia and the Western Pacific, where 90-95% of cases are classed as Type-2.

At least three people have been killed and several badly injured in a huge landslide in a rural area of the north-western American state of Washington, officials say. The landslide destroyed six houses and covered a road near the town of Oso, about 90km (55 miles) north of Seattle.