A study published in the scientific journal The Lancet revealed that the number of people with chronic kidney disease around the world has more than doubled since 1990, reaching 788 million people in 2023.
The study showed that the disease caused 1.48 million deaths during the same year, noting that diabetes, obesity, and high blood pressure are among the most prominent causes of infection.
The researchers wrote that chronic kidney disease “represents a major health condition” and plays a “prominent role among noncommunicable diseases,” but it receives less attention from policy makers than other diseases.
The results showed that these diseases were the ninth cause of death globally in 2023, while kidney failure represented about 12% of the total deaths resulting from cardiovascular diseases.
This sharp rise is partly due to population growth and the aging of societies, as the disease mainly affects the elderly.
The study added that being overweight increases the risk of diabetes, which is one of the causes of kidney failure, pointing out that more than 14% of the world’s population was living with chronic kidney disease in 2023, most of them in the early stages of the disease.