On World Health Day, doctors at CARE Hospitals have flagged a worrying trend: lifestyle diseases such as diabetes, hypertension, and fatty liver are increasingly affecting younger, working‑age Indians, often reaching advanced stages before diagnosis.
“Today we are diagnosing diabetes, high blood pressure and fatty liver in people in their 30s and early 40s,” said Dr. H. Guru Prasad, Clinical Director and HOD, General Medicine, CARE Hospitals, Banjara Hills. “Many of these are picked up late because individuals don’t go for routine check‑ups. By the time symptoms appear, the disease has already progressed.”
Recent data show that nearly 1 in 4 Indian adults may have hypertension, with a large proportion remaining undiagnosed. India is also among the countries with the highest diabetes burden, and early‑onset cases are becoming more common in urban populations. Yet, preventive health behaviour has not kept pace with rising risk.
Doctors attribute the shift to modern urban lifestyles, long working hours, poor diet, physical inactivity, disrupted sleep, and increasing heat‑stress exposure. Despite feeling “healthy,” many young adults carry hidden risk factors such as high blood sugar, elevated cholesterol, or fatty liver, which only emerge during unrelated consultations or emergencies.
“Health cannot be managed only when something goes wrong,” Dr. Prasad added. “Preventive health is no longer a choice but something every adult should consciously plan for.”
CARE Hospitals recommends that individuals above the age of 30 undergo a basic annual health check‑up, including blood sugar tests, blood pressure monitoring, lipid profile, liver function tests, and BMI‑based weight assessment. The hospital group is scaling up structured screening programmes, community awareness drives, and corporate health partnerships to promote early detection and risk reduction.
As India’s disease burden shifts, doctors emphasise that the next decade will be defined not by advanced treatment alone, but by how effectively individuals and healthcare systems embrace early detection and prevention, especially for the country’s young working‑age population.
