Diabetes pounds young, old in Zimbabwe

By Jeffrey Moyo

HARARE, Zimbabwe (AA) - At 13, 44-year-old Nyson Chihota’s only child, Jimmy, died from diabetes last year in the Zimbabwean capital of Harare.

As if that was not enough, Nyson’s mother, Lisa Chihota, 76, was killed by diabetes at the family’s village home in Guruve, a district in Mashonaland Central Province.

In Harare’s Mabelreign middle-income suburb, just two months ago, Calvin Gondo, 10, a boy who was in primary school doing grade three, was also killed by diabetes.

The only child of Megan and Marlon Gondo, Calvin died at home in the arms of his mother as he battled the silent killer.

“We lost him. My son died in my hands and he was just weak and yes, he suffered from diabetes which was discovered by doctors five years ago. So, for all these years, Calvin’s life was just laden with sickness from diabetes each now and then, and he has been in and out of the hospital,” Megan Gondo told Anadolu Agency.

- Killing young and old

As the world commemorates World Diabetes Day, an annual event on Nov. 14, in Zimbabwe, diabetes has become common, afflicting the young and old.

It has even killed young children like Jimmy and Calvin and it does not spare the elderly like Chihota.

Yet, for some elderly Zimbabweans like 71-year-old Mirirai Bopoto, discovering the condition has taken years – coming way too late even as she has had to suffer silently at her home in Harare.

For children who suffer from diabetes, health experts have said they do not live longer, typical of Jimmy and Calvin.

“Often children who are found to be suffering from diabetes don’t live to teenagehood. It’s rare as they die much earlier,” Josphat Mawire, a private medical practitioner in Harare, told Anadolu Agency.

According to the latest World Health Organization data published in 2018, diabetes deaths in Zimbabwe reached 3,590 or 3% of total deaths, including some of the country’s children like Jimmy and Calvin whose lives are cut short by the disease.

- Discovering illness late

In Zimbabwe, as the young and old alike are turning into victims of diabetes, Mawire said “most die before getting help or at a time they would have discovered their illness way too late.”

It is estimated that 10 in every 100 people have diabetes in Zimbabwe, according to the Zimbabwe Diabetic Association (ZDA).

Simion Jamanda, the ZDA administrator, said “diabetes is a life-induced condition, so the lifestyle of today is our challenge.”

To this, diabetes activists in Harare, like 37-year-old Linda Murara, living with diabetes, attributed rising cases to eating habits.

“People are having access to sugary foods, to too much carbohydrates and a lot of unhealthier foods and these have triggered diabetes amongst many people including the young and the old,” Murara told Anadolu Agency.

- Expensive to treat

Yet, diabetes treatment is much more expensive in Zimbabwe, with insulin injection costing $20 for a week’s supply, with a single patient requiring an average of $80 to manage the condition every month, according to the ZDA.

Meanwhile, glucometers used for testing blood sugar levels cost anywhere between $20 and $45 in this southern African nation, meaning in a country with 90% unemployment, very few can afford the cost.

“Long term illness such as diabetes is more costly to treat - not only for the health sector, but also for the economy, with costs to workers themselves and employers a loss of tax revenues, and costs to households,” said Itai Rusike, executive director at the Community Working Group on Health.

- Hard to get drugs

As such, even access to diabetic drugs for treatment has become hard to come by in Zimbabwe, according to Rusike.

“There is evidence that drug access for diabetes has fallen in recent years, and that drug availability is falling, most sharply at the clinic services that form the frontline of the health care system with the community,” Rusike told Anadolu Agency.

For Rusike, “this represents an unfair cost burden on poor communities, but also opens the way for the growth of private unregulated drug markets.”

Meanwhile, according to the Health Ministry, Zimbabwe is facing rising levels of noncommunicable diseases like diabetes which has caused more tears in families, killing the young and the old.

- Fearing to know

Jimmy’s father, Nyson Gondo, is unsure about his diabetic condition, having lost his son and mother to the silent killer.

“I don’t know whether I might be having diabetes or not and I don’t want to attempt to find out because that would mark the beginning of my suffering if I may be found with the disease,” he said.