COVID-19 is linked to more diabetes diagnoses among kids, CDC study finds - CBS News

The study, published on January 7, found that children and teens are more likely to be diagnosed with diabetes a month or more after their COVID infection, compared to those who did not have COVID. .

They found that children in the IQVIA database diagnosed with COVID-19 during that time were 166% more likely than those who did not have COVID to be diagnosed later with diabetes.

In the HealthVerity database, children with COVID were 31% more likely to get a new diabetes diagnosis. .

Researchers said children who had COVID were also 116% more likely to develop diabetes than those who had non-COVID respiratory infections prior to the pandemic.

"If you are in the process of developing diabetes, will an infection really push you into a diagnosis more quickly than you might otherwise have experienced?" she said.

"I think this is likely, we don't have the data, but that these kids were on their way to developing diabetes.

"And maybe having this infection pushed them towards an earlier diagnosis.".

Researchers noted this in their study, saying that the development of diabetes could be attributed to how COVID affects the body's organs, such as the "direct attack of the pancreatic cells." Researchers said it's also likely that some of the patients included in the study already had prediabetes when they contracted COVID

Regardless of whether pediatric diabetes cases stem directly from the virus itself or from these broader ramifications, Magge said the study is "definitely alarming," especially when considering the long-term impact

Having COVID or any other viral infection while also having diabetes can also make it more difficult to manage diabetes, Dr

"COVID, in particular, really seems to be putting kids at risk for diabetic ketoacidosis much more frequently when they have type 2 diabetes than we saw with other viral infections in the past," she said

But Magge said that there's no way to know what the long-term effects of having COVID will be, regardless of symptoms. 

and we don't have data about whether vaccination will decrease the risk of developing diabetes after COVID infection yet because it's very new