More than half of California is diabetic or pre-diabetic, says a new study out by the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research and the California Center for Public Health Advocacy. Without treatment, more than 70 percent of pre-diabetics will eventually get the disease.
“The numbers are so large that they stop you in your tracks. … It’s hard to digest that the situation is as bad as it is,” Dr. Harold Goldstein, the report’s co-author and executive director of the California Center for Public Health Advocacy, told The Sacramento Bee.
Researchers placed the blame for California’s diabetics epidemic on obesity. “The way we changed the rates of smoking in California, (making it) socially unacceptable, was a great thing. Changing the way people eat is going to be tougher,” said Dr. Francisco Prieto, a family practitioner in Sacramento.
The report comes as three lawmakers proposed a soda-tax for the state ballot. (Berkeley became the first U.S. city to pass a soda-tax in 2014). A 2-cent tax would raise an estimated $2.3 billion a year toward obesity and diabetes prevention efforts. As of 2012, diabetes had cost California $24.5 billion to treat, according to the State Department of Public Health and the University of San Francisco.