Union Minister Jitendra Singh on Saturday said COVID-19 poses trying times for diabetics who are more vulnerable to the contagious disease as they have low resistance to infections.
He said the coronavirus death rate in India has been low in comparison to other countries and most of the deaths that occurred here were among those COVID-19 positive patients who were also suffering from co-morbidities or chronic disorders like diabetes.
Delivering the inaugural address at the 'World Congress of Indian Academy of Diabetes' online, the minister said those suffering from diabetes have an immuno-comprised status, which tends to reduce their resistance and make them more vulnerable to infections like coronavirus as well as consequent complications.
"This leads to an even more vulnerable situation when a patient suffering from diabetes also has kidney involvement or diabtic-nephropathy, chronic kidney disease etc," said Singh, Minister of State for Personnel who is also a renowned diabetologist.
In a situation like this, he said the diabetologists owed a special responsibility to their patients in keeping their blood sugar level strictly under control to avoid infection and at the same time educating them about the precautions to be exercised, according to an official statement.
Singh said COVID-19 poses trying times for diabetics, it said.
"While coronavirus has taught us to live with new norms, it has also given the physicians a cue to emphasize on the non-pharmacological methods of management including hygiene etc. which had somehow lost due importance in recent years," said the minister.
He said even after the COVID pandemic is over, the discipline of social distancing and avoiding droplet infection will act as safeguard against many other infections as well.
"Like in many other fields, even in academics COVID has prompted us to discover new norms in adversity, which is visibly evident in the success of an international (online) conference like this of such a big magnitude," Singh said.
He complimented renowned endocrinologists Shashank Joshi from Mumbai, Banshi Saboo from Ahmedabad and the entire team of organizers for having brought together the best of faculty from as many as four continents of the world, including eminent world scholars of diabetes like Andrew Boulton, President International Diabetes Federation, Fracese Xavier, Itarnar Raz, Florian Totai as well as leading Indian diabetologists like V Mohan, Arvind Gupta and others.