A new study by King’s College London has revealed that lowering blood sugar levels in people with pre-diabetes can reduce the risk of fatal heart disease by more than 50%, which contradicts the prevailing concept for decades about the role of lifestyle changes in prevention.
According to a report published in The Lancet on Friday, the study relied on analyzing data from two major clinical trials: the US Diabetes Prevention Program Outcomes Study and the Da Qing Diabetes Prevention Study in China.
Researchers found that returning glucose levels to normal, i.e., recovering from the pre-diabetic stage, reduces the risk of death from cardiovascular disease or the need for hospitalization due to heart failure by 58%, and also contributes to reducing heart attacks and strokes by 42%. Crucially, these health benefits persisted for decades.
Towards a New Goal Beyond Lifestyle Changes
Dr. Andreas Birkenfeld, the study’s principal investigator and lecturer in the Department of Diabetes at King’s College London, commented: “This study questions one of the most important assumptions in modern preventative medicine. For many years, people with pre-diabetes have been advised to follow a healthy diet, lose weight, and exercise, as ways to prevent heart disease, but the evidence does not unequivocally support this.”
He pointed out that previous analyses showed that these lifestyle interventions, although delaying the progression of diabetes, were not sufficient on their own to reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease.
A Silent Global Crisis
Pre-diabetes affects more than a billion people worldwide, impacting one in five adults in the UK, one in three in the US, and four in ten in China. It is one of the main risk factors for heart disease, which is in turn a leading cause of death globally.
Birkenfeld added: “The results of this study mean that recovery from pre-diabetes can become a major preventative tool, alongside lowering blood pressure, reducing cholesterol, and quitting smoking.”
A Radical Shift in Treatment Strategy
Health experts welcomed the study’s results, considering them a “life-saving shift,” and called for normalizing blood glucose levels to be a priority in treatment, rather than relying solely on lifestyle recommendations.
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