Prevalence of Diagnosed Diabetes in Circumpolar Indigenous Populations

Young T K (Northem Health Research Unit, Department of Community Health Sciences, University of Manitoba, 705 Bannatyne Avenue, Winnipeg, Manitoba, R3E OW3, Canada), Schraer C D, Shubnikoff E V, Szathmery E J E and Nikitin Y P. Prevalence of diagnosed diabetes in circumpolar indigenous populations. Internationel Journal of Epidemiology 1992; 21 : 730–736 The prevalence of diagnosed diabetes in several genetically closely related indigenous populations in the circumpolar arctic and subarctic regions of Russia, Alaska and Canada is compared. The age-standardized (to the IARC's hypothetical world population) prevalence ranged from 1.8/1000 among the Chukchi and Eskimo of Chukotka, 3.6 and 7.9/1000 among the Eskimcrs/Inuit of the Canadian Northwest Territories (NWT) and Alaska respectively, 7.1, 9.3 and 18.6/1000 among Athapaskan Indians in the NWT, Yukon and Alaska respectively, to a high of 22.7/1000 among the Aleuts in Alaska. All are below the US all-race prevalence of 23.5/1000 and far below the extreme high prevalence reported from many North American Indian tribes. As a group, such arctic and subarctic peoples have a much shorter and less intense history of European contact and accutturation. Environmental factors are also likely to be responsible for the current differences between these indigenous populations in the circumpolar region, assuming that they share susceptibility genee for diabetes inferred from their closa genetic relationships based on markers in other loci. Formal surveys of glucose tolerance and potential risk factors such as diet, physical activity, obesity, insulin resistance and genetic admixture in the circumpolar region would improve knowledge of the aetiology of diabetes in genetically and culturally diverse human populations.