Is COVID-19 causing diabetes and high blood sugars? Here's what doctors have to say

New Delhi| Jagran Lifestyle Desk: The U.S. National Institutes of Health is conducting a research into how the coronavirus may be causing high blood sugar and diabetes. Several cases have been reported in the United States where blood sugar levels increase in Covid-19 patients and this has become a worry for the health experts. As more and more case the dangerous relationship between diabetes and Covid-19 come, doctors and scientists around the world have begun their researches to study this.

Reuters reported a case in which a 28-year-old father, Mario Buelna caught a fever and he faced trouble breathing in June. Later, he tested positive for Covid19.

A few weeks later, he recovered from coronavirus but in the post-covid19 recovery period he felt weak and started vomiting and on August 1, at 3 AM, he passed out on the floor of his home in Mesa, Arizona.

After which the paramedics took him to the hospital, where he was put on the intensive care after saving him from a coma. The doctors told him that he could have died. However, what came as a shock was that he was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes and he had no history of the disease.

Buelna said the doctors told that Covid triggered it.

In July, U.S. health officials found that nearly 40% of people who have died with Covid-19 had diabetes. Now with the cases like Buelna, it indicates that the connection between the diseases runs both ways.

“Covid could be causing diabetes from scratch,” said Dr Francesco Rubino, a diabetes researcher and chair of metabolic and bariatric surgery at King’s College London.

Rubino is working on the research in which she is leading an international team that is collecting patient cases globally to unravel one of the biggest mysteries of the pandemic. Initially, he said, more than 300 doctors have applied to share cases for review, a number he expects to grow as infections flare up again.

“These cases are coming from every corner of the world and every continent,” Rubino told Reuters.

“We have more questions than answers right now,” said Dr Robert Eckel, president of medicine and science at the American Diabetes Association. “We could be dealing with an entirely new form of diabetes.”

How does Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes occur in a body?

The Type 1 diabetes occurs in a body when the immune system damages the insulin-producing cells in the pancreas, preventing the regulation of blood sugar levels. It is reported that approximately 1.6 million Americans have the disease.

Type 1 has symptoms like extreme thirst, fatigue, frequent urination and weight loss.

The Type 2 diabetes occurs in a body when the cells of a body become insulin-resistant, allowing blood sugar to rise. The cases of Type 2 diabetes is prevalent in more than 30 million Americans.

It is reported that this year, the doctors are seeing Type 2 diabetes symptoms like overweight - experience a diabetic emergency after exposure to Covid-19.

Doctors have said that it may take complicate efforts to detect whether and how the coronavirus might be causing diabetes.

In a study published in August, researchers at Imperial College in London and several hospitals there found that cases of type 1 diabetes among children nearly doubled to 30 during late March to early June - as the pandemic raged - compared to the same period in previous years. Five of the children tested positive for a prior coronavirus infection, but the study’s authors said many of the children were not tested.

In the United States, Children’s Hospital Los Angeles said the percentage of newly diagnosed type 2 patients who arrived in diabetic ketoacidosis, a potentially fatal buildup of acid in the blood, has nearly doubled for March through August compared to the same period in 2018 and 2019.

Dr Lily Chao, director of the type 2 diabetes clinic there, said the hospital is still investigating whether this increase is driven by exposure to Covid-19.

“We’ve seen more type 1 cases this year than I ever remember,” Edwards said. “There were three kids in the pediatric ICU at the same time. That is so rare.”

Buelna said that “I want to get better so I can see my kids grow up,” he said. “I’m not ready to go yet.” He is on a glucose monitor more than two months after his diagnosis. Buelna's wife Erica is eight months pregnant and they have a 3-year-old daughter, Katalina. The family got an eviction notice on Aug. 2, while Mario was in the ICU, and they rely on a food bank for some meals.

The 28-year-old also said that he fell into a depression in the hospital, cut off from family visits, and credits his sister with lifting his spirits in phone calls.