Prevalence of Diabetes in the Adult Population in Bangladesh during the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Cross-Sectional Analysis of Physical, Social, and Economical Factors

Author(s): Al Muktadir Munam, Ahammad Hossain, Rejvi Ahmed Bhuiya, Mohammad Zulficar Ali

Background Every individual's life has been influenced by the COVID-19 pandemic, including their socioeconomic status, livelihood, and physical and mental health. It has been found that individuals with underlying diseases, such as diabetes, have a high death rate, and, more notably, half of all diabetes mellitus is undiagnosed globally. The objective of this study was to assess the prevalence of diabetes during the COVID-19 pandemic and to identify the factors and their associations.

Methods and Materials According to the study objectives, a cross-sectional online survey was performed to collect primary data. The population was made up of the Bangladeshi adult population who were over the age of 18 and have been diagnosed with diabetes or infected with COVID-19. Out of 450 received responses, 390 responses were analyzed after removing incomplete or ineligible data. The relationship between the status of diabetes and various covariates was investigated using Chi-square analysis. The influencing factors associated with the risk of diabetes among participants were identified using a multiple logistic regression model. The odds ratios (OR) with 95 % confidence intervals (CI) were calculated. The significance level was two-sided, and statistical significance was defined as p<0.05. SPSS windows version 25.0 was used to analyze the data.

Results In this study, 80.8% of the patients tested positive for COVID-19 at least once, and 20% of the participants had diabetes. The study result indicates that age, gender, BMI, marital status, family status (nuclear or joint), educational qualification, profession, COVID-19 status, systolic and diastolic blood pressure are the factors which are significantly associated (p<0.05) with diabetes during the pandemic. Participants who tested positive for covid had a 1.6 times increased risk of diabetes (OR = 3.913; 95% CI: 1.56 - 9.814; p = 0.004). Changes i