Black children are much more likely than whites to be affected by the hidden epidemic of diabetes, a world health campaigner said on Tuesday.

Australian professor Dr. Martin Silink (pictured) told Hamilton Rotarians: ?The Centre for Disease Control in Atlanta predicted that of the children born in the US in the year 2000 one in three would develop diabetes in their lifetime. If they happen to belong to a minority group, African American, Latino American or Indigenous American then this prediction risk rises to one in two.

?These are frightening figures. There are some nations that are genetically at increased risk and that cannot cope with even a mild increase in body weight,? he said. ?If they are genetically programmed to put the weight on in the trunk, the abdomen, then this is much more damaging than putting the weight on generally.?

Dr. Silink said the diabetes epidemic had to be turned around and islands were ?sentinels? that tended to forecast what was happening in the rest of the world.

?Diabetes is a hidden epidemic but it is an epidemic nonetheless,? Dr. Silink said. ?It is rising at the rate of six million per year.?

He said diabetes caused a death every ten seconds, an amputation every 30 seconds and increased the risk of heart disease by four times. ?All forms of diabetes do cause harm,? he said. ?It is now affecting young people and even children, teenagers, young mothers and people in their productive years. At the height of their energies and abilities in terms of business and looking after their families.? He said he had no doubt that Bermuda had one of the highest rates of diabetes in the world.

?About ten years ago the incident of diabetes in Bermuda was recorded at about 9.7 percent among adults,? he said. ?But the people working here indicate that this is an underestimate and currently the figure is closer to 18 or 20 percent.?