Canadian Diabetes Strategy Diabetes in Canada - Second Edition

Highlights of NDSS data include the following:

• there was a 5.1% prevalence of diabetes among adult Canadians in 1999/2000;
• 1,196,370 adult Canadians were living with diagnosed diabetes in 1999/2000;
• Canadian adults with diabetes are twice as likely to die prematurely compared with adults without diabetes, and
• 41,483 adult Canadians with diabetes died in 1999/2000.

The data presented are derived from the data collection period starting in 1995/1996. The first two years constituted the run-in period required by the case definition. Therefore, the earliest data presented here are for the fiscal year 1997/1998, and the most recent year of data available for this report is 1999/2000.

The information represents eight provinces and three territories, accounting for over 95% of the Canadian population. Data from New Brunswick and Newfoundland and Labrador are not included.

The data include both type 1 and type 2 diabetes, as ICD-9 (code 250) does not differentiate between the two. However, since the data are restricted to people aged 20 years and over, they largely represent type 2 diabetes. Although gestational diabetes has its own ICD-9 code (648.0), it is often miscoded as type 1/type 2 and therefore some cases of gestational diabetes are included in these tabulations.

NDSS Data