MPs measure up for diabetes UK

Diabetes UK, the leading charity for diabetes in the UK, has worked hard to promote its ‘Measure Up’ campaign. The new campaign aims to highlight the risk of large waist measurements as a major risk factor in the development of type 2 diabetes. Recent participants in the campaign included several MPs.
Large waistlines and increased abdominal fat are often associated with obesity and pre-diabetes (also metabolic syndrome or syndrome X), and the diabetes UK campaign aims to raise awareness. Getting ‘measured up’, they claim, is the first stage in preventing diabetes.
Several MPS were pictured getting measured up, including the Minister for Diabetes (Rosie Winterton MP) and the Chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group for Diabetes, Adrian Sanders MP.
The campaign aims to reach the undiagnosed mass living in the UK, up to 750,000 people are expected to have diabetes and not know it. Chief Executive of Diabetes UK, Douglas Smallwood, said: “We are pleased to be welcomed so warmly in parliament. Members of the All Party Parliamentary Group for Diabetes, Ministers and Shadow Ministers came along to show their support and get measured up themselves. It goes to show that there is political will to do more to get people diagnosed. We would like Primary Care Trusts to put plans in place to identify people with diabetes. The longer people are left undiagnosed, the higher their risk of heart attacks, blindness, kidney failure and amputations.”