Current and future economic burden of diabetes among working-age adults in Asia: conservative estimates for Singapore from 2010-2050

Abstract

Type 2 diabetes mellitus is a chronic metabolic disease which results not only in significant direct medical costs but indirect productivity losses due to disability and early mortality. For this reason, the future growth of type 2 diabetes is an increasing concern to researchers worldwide: in the U.S. for instance, type 2 diabetes is projected to almost double from a disease population of 23.7 million in 2009 to 44.1 million in 2034, resulting in a more-than-proportional tripling of diabetes-related spending from US$113 billion to US$336 billion [1]. However, the composition of social costs varies significantly by population subgroups: while many analyses focus on the direct cost burden for older and retired individuals, in the working-age population, lost productivity can far exceed disease-related spending [2].