Canberra Liberals leader Elizabeth Lee says she has had personal experience with gestational diabetes. Photo: Ian Bushnell.
The Canberra Liberals have promised to provide $4.4 million to advocacy group Diabetes Australia if elected to government after the 19 October election.
Leader Elizabeth Lee said $3.4 million would be invested towards a preventative health program for Canberrans at risk of developing diabetes and $1 million spent on a community education campaign to increase awareness of gestational diabetes.
“We know that diabetes is a disease that affects thousands of Canberrans and a lot of those cases can be largely prevented,” Ms Lee told media at a press conference on Thursday (10 October).
“I’ve had my own personal experience of being diagnosed with gestational diabetes and I couldn’t fault the service. Our initiative is to ensure there is more focus and more funding for the preventative measures.”
Justine Cane, CEO of Diabetes Australia, said this funding was urgently needed.
“We are in the midst of a diabetes epidemic,” she said.
“In the last 10 years, we’ve had a 32 per cent increase in people being diagnosed with diabetes… we must arrest this epidemic. Research shows approximately 58 per cent of type 2 diabetes can be prevented or delayed if you get access to the right sort of services.
“Prevention programs are proven and they’re powerful. We need every government to prioritise them.”
Shadow Health Minister Leanne Castley says more than 16,000 Canberrans have type 2 diabetes, with many of these cases largely preventable. Photo: Region.
Shadow Health Minister Leanne Castley said the preventative health service would involve one-on-one coaching with a qualified health coach to understand, manage and improve their health, especially the risk factors associated with diabetes.
“In the ACT we have over 2300 Canberrans living with type 1 diabetes and over 16,800 with type 2 diabetes,” she said.
“Diabetes Australia currently offers preventative health services in Tasmania, Queensland and NSW and is well equipped to deliver a similar service here in the ACT.”
Thursday’s press conference also heard from a man named “Joe”, who said he had been diagnosed with diabetes 10 years ago and has since improved his health.
“Joe” said he would have benefitted from more education earlier.
“In the beginning, I got given a lot of wrong information. It all started from me going to a bookshop saying ‘you can reverse type 2 diabetes’ … it’s about management, knowing what’s good and what’s bad. The rest is history.”
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