ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Endocrinol.
Sec. Clinical Diabetes
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fendo.2025.1600333
This article is part of the Research TopicDiabetes Care Reform: Improve Health and Health EquityView all 12 articles
The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on the Global Burden of Type 2 Diabetes: A Study Based on GBD 2021 Data
Provisionally accepted
- 1The Second Hospital of Sanming, Yongan, China
- 2Fujian Medical University, Fuzhou, China
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Background This study aimed to comprehensively assess the impact of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic on the global burden of type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) using data from the Global Burden of Diseases (GBD) 2021. Methods Age-standardized T2DM prevalence, incidence, mortality, and disability-adjusted life years (DALYs) were analyzed from Global Burden of Diseases (GBD) 2021. Pre-pandemic (2010– 2019) and post-pandemic (2020–2021) periods were defined to capture pandemic onset, with 2020–2021 as the earliest available global post-pandemic data. Expected annual percentage changes (EAPC) were derived to assess the magnitude and direction of trends over the study period, adjusting for age, sex, and sociodemographic index. Post-pandemic projections to 2030 employed a Bayesian model with pre-/post-pandemic slope comparisons. Results Global T2DM prevalence (ages ≥20) rose from 6,887.07 per 100,000 in 2010 to 9,545.42 per 100,000 in 2021. Post-pandemic acceleration was observed: EAPC increased from 2.90% (95% CI: 2.86–2.94) pre-pandemic to 3.52% (95% CI: 3.14–3.90) post-pandemic. Mortality and DALYs showed similar accelerations. Despite continued increases in incidence, mortality, and DALYs, the EAPC decreased in the post-pandemic period. Projections using pre-pandemic data (up to 2019) estimated type 2 diabetes prevalence at 10368.23 per 100,000 population by 2030. However, incorporating post-pandemic data (up to 2021) increased the projected 2030 prevalence to 10694.79 per 100,000, indicating a rise of 326.56 per 100,000 attributed to the pandemic's impact. The prevalence, incidence, deaths, and DALYs of CKD due to T2DM all showed an upward trend from 2010 to 2021. Conclusions A rapid increase in the burden of T2DM is found post-COVID-19 pandemic. Enhanced public health interventions are required for the prevention, screening, and management of diabetes.
Keywords: Global burden of disease, type 2 diabetes, COVID-19, Burden, Epidemiology
Received: 26 Mar 2025; Accepted: 29 Sep 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Chen, Hui, Wu, Wang, Lin and JIAOFENG. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: HUANG JIAOFENG, huangjiaofeng@fjmu.edu.cn
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