Diabetes is a life-long disease marked by elevated levels of sugar (glucose) in the blood. It can be caused by too little insulin (a chemical produced by the pancreas to regulate blood sugar), resistance to insulin, or both. Approximately 2.7 million or 11.4% of all African Americans aged 20 years or older have diabetes. However, one-third of them do not know it.
The most life-threatening consequences of diabetes are heart disease and stroke, which strike people with diabetes more than twice as often as they do others. Adults with diabetes have heart disease death rates 2 to 4 times higher than those without diabetes. African Americans with diabetes are at increased risk for heart disease, stroke and other macro vascular complications. Other complications of diabetes include blindness, kidney disease, and amputations.
Most African Americans (about 90 to 95 percent) with diabetes have type 2 diabetes. This type of diabetes usually develops in adults and is caused by the body's......

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Title: Diabetes
Approximate Word Count: 792
Approximate Pages: 4 (250 words per double-spaced page)

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