June 21, 2023 – The FDA approved the drugs Jardiance and Synjardy to be used by children ages 10 and older with type 2 diabetes.
Type 2 diabetes affects greater than 30,000 children within the U.S., and health officials expect the number to rise to 220,000 children by 2060, the FDA said in an announcement Press release.
Until now, the drug metformin was the one other oral option for treating type 2 diabetes in children. Type 2 diabetes is a condition by which the body cannot properly process sugar, most of which comes from food. Both Jardiance and Synjardy contain an lively ingredient called empagliflozin, which increases the discharge of glucose within the urine. Synjardy also accommodates metformin. The medication ought to be taken together with a healthy eating regimen and exercise.
Both drugs are already approved by the FDA to be used in adults with type 2. Synjardy was approved in 2015 and Jardiance in 2014. Both medications not only help control glucose levels but additionally have cardiovascular advantages for adults.
The recent approval was based on results from a study of 157 children ages 10 to 17 with type 2 diabetes that was not well controlled, the FDA said in its news release. That study was accomplished in May and the FDA accelerated approval of the drug based on the outcomes.
Health officials are concerned concerning the number of kids being diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. For young people between the ages of 10 and 19, CDC According to data, in 2001, 34 out of 100,000 had this disease. In 2017, that rate increased to 67 per 100,000. Type 2 diabetes in children disproportionately affects Black, Hispanic and Native American children.
The Mayo Clinic says it's unclear what causes some people to develop type 2 diabetes, although family history and genes play a task. Uncontrolled diabetes may cause heart and blood vessel problems, stroke, nerve damage, kidney disease and vision problems, including blindness.
“Until recently, young children and adolescents almost never developed type 2 diabetes, which is why it was previously known as adult-onset diabetes,” the CDC explains in its report Diabetes prevention website. “Now about a third of American teenagers are overweight, a problem that is closely linked to the increase in children with type 2 diabetes, some as young as 10 years old.”