Heather has shown her support for people living with diabetes by attending a reception in Parliament hosted by Diabetes UK.
Launching a new report as part of the charity’s Diabetes Is Serious campaign, the event shone a spotlight on the challenges facing the five million people living with diabetes in the UK and included a number of recommendations for improving care and tackling health inequality.
The report includes shocking new figures showing that there were 7,000 excess deaths involving diabetes in 2022, 13% higher than expected. Diabetes UK fears the increase may be linked to the backlog in routine diabetes care caused by the Covid-19 pandemic when services faced huge disruptions.
The charity is calling on the Government to put diabetes care at the heart of the Major Conditions Strategy to restore these checks to reduce early mortality, prevent people developing devastating diabetes complications and to reduce pressure on the NHS.
The event was attended by more than 70 MPs, and attendees heard from Diabetes UK chief executive, Chris Askew OBE, and people with lived experience of diabetes.
Heather says:
“I welcome the high percentage of people that received all 8 vital diabetes checks in Derby and Derbyshire between 2021 and 2022 (47.8%), and will continue to support the hard work of our ICB to ensure this number continues to increase”.
