15 States With The Highest Diabetes Rates In U.S.

In this article, we present the 15 states with the highest diabetes rates in the U.S. Click to skip ahead and see the 5 states with the highest diabetes rates in the US. At the end of this article we will also let you know which diabetes stock hedge funds are piling into right now.

One of the biggest issues facing the United States, and the world in general, is diabetes. Let’s take a look at the states contributing the most to this. Diabetes is a global threat, with over 422 million people infected in 2014, with the prevalence being 8.5% for adults over 18 years. That means one out of every 12 people you know will get diagnosed with diabetes at some point in the future. In 2016, an incredible 1.6 million people died from diabetes. That’s 650 thousand more than the total COVID-19 deaths, yet nobody is attempting to close ice cream shops, or ban sugary drinks. You can learn more about diabetes at the global level by reading our article about the 11 countries with the highest diabetes rates in the world. Yet, many people, especially in the United States do not take proper precautions.

The US diabetes prevalence figures exceed the global trend, which is worrying since the global trend is already high due to undeveloped or developing countries, and the US, being a global superpower, should already be doing much more to prevent this deadly disease from wreaking havoc. However, in the US, 10.5% of the entire population, or 34.2 million people, have diabetes. The more alarming thing is that 7.3 million adults who met all the criteria for diabetes were unaware of the disease they had, which goes some way in explaining why the disease is so prevalent. After all, you can’t fight what you don’t know.

There are also 100,000 kids and teens under the age of 18 who have diabetes. The prevalence of diabetes keeps increasing with age, reaching a high of nearly 27% for adults aged over 65. Imagine more than a quarter of your age group carrying a disease which claims more than a million lives globally each year. If you are between the ages of 45 and 64, there is a 17.5% chance that you have diabetes and you may not even aware of it.

While some of the reasons for higher prevalence include a change in the sex and race composition (diabetes affects men and non white people more), the biggest change is due to the huge increase in obesity levels in the country. Nearly a hundred million or 1/3rd of the entire population is overweight in the US, while 75 million people are obese. Obesity is thought to account for 80-85% of type 2 diabetes, which is a major indicator of why diabetes is increasing. The sedentary lifestyle, coupled with the fast food addiction is a major reason for this boon. It isn’t a coincidence that the US is among the 11 fattest countries in the world.

For our rankings, we used the most reliable source, the CDC data, to find the states with the highest diabetes rates in the United States. Each of these states have a higher rate than the national median at 9.5%. So let’s take a look at the states that have the highest diabetes rates, starting with number 15:

15.  North Carolina: 10.1%

10.1% people in North Carolina are diagnosed with diabetes, having doubled in just the last 25 years. This means over 1 million people in North Carolina have diabetes.

14. Missouri: 10.2%

Every year, around 38,000 people in Missouri are diagnosed with diabetes, which is a worrying statistic in itself. Pre-diabetes, where sugar levels are high but not enough to be diagnosed as diabetes, is also present in 1/3rd of Missourians, though the vast majority doesn’t even realize it.

13. Indiana: 10.4%

Indiana has over 700,000 diabetes patients, where nearly a quarter of these people do not even know this fact. A further 1.7 million people also have pre-diabetes.

12. New Mexico: 10.4%

Another state where diabetes prevalence doubled in just the last 25 years is New Mexico, where 10.4% of the population is diagnosed with diabetes and 14.1% of the population approximately has diabetes.

11. Texas: 10.9%

Nearly 3 million people in the state of Texas have diabetes, of which over 650,000 people are not even aware of the fact that they are inflicted with the disease. Nearly 7 million people in the state have prediabetes.

10. Oklahoma: 10.9%

Over 450,000 people have diabetes in Oklahoma, while 1 million people have prediabetes as well, and the state needs to do a lot more to prevent this from happening.

9. Louisiana: 11.1%

Nearly 1 in 8 people in Louisiana have diabetes, and is among the leading causes of deaths in the state. It also has the 5th highest mortality rate in the country which is a major concern.

8. Tennessee: 11.2%

Tennessee has around 900,000 people with diabetes, including both diagnosed and undiagnosed patients. While the state is working to improve the situation, it is obvious that both short term and long term goals need to be kept in mind to reduce this number permanently.

7. Georgia: 11.4%

More than a million people have diabetes in Georgia, with several hundred thousand more dealing with prediabetes.

6. South Carolina: 11.5%

Nearly 600,000 people in South Carolina have diabetes, while an additional 1.3 million people also have prediabetes, making it one of the states with the highest diabetes rates in U.S.

Click to see the 5 states with the highest diabetes rates in the US and find out which diabetes stock hedge funds are piling into.

Disclosure: 15 States With The Highest Diabetes Rates In U.S. is originally published at Insider Monkey.