More and more people suffer chronically from autoimmune diseases. In Germany, the frequency increased by 22 percent between 2012 and 2022, according to billing data from physicians with a health insurance contract. This is evident from a first extensive analysis of approximately 70 million people insured for diseases such as rheumatism, psoriasis, ulcerative colitis, etc.
The main result of the study*: In 2022, 6.3 million people would be diagnosed with an autoimmune disease. This meant that approximately 8.61 percent of policyholders suffered from one of these chronic diseases. In 2012, 7.06 percent of people had such a diagnosis. That meant an increase of 22 percent.
Of the 30 autoimmune diseases whose frequency was examined, 28 showed an increase.
Various reasons for the increase are suspected
The reasons for the increase in autoimmune diseases are not known in detail. Women are affected more often than men. Various bacterial and viral infectious diseases, environmental influences and lifestyle factors are considered risk factors.
Demographic developments also play a role, of course. Long Covid patients also show signs of an autoimmune disease in their blood.
The results of the research:
- The frequency of the two chronic inflammatory bowel diseases, Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis, increased by 35 percent and 34 percent respectively, and that of psoriasis by 17 percent.
- The number of celiac disease cases increased by 130 percent.
- The increase in the common thyroid disease Hashimoto’s thyroiditis was 72 percent.
- Within ten years, the number of diagnoses of multiple sclerosis has increased by 32 percent.
- The frequency of rheumatoid arthritis (chronic polyarthritis) increased by 17 percent.
- There was only a decrease in type 1 diabetes (minus 18 percent) and a second rare autoimmune disease (Sjögren’s syndrome/minus 27 percent).
- Most recently, Hashimoto’s disease was diagnosed most frequently at 2.30 percent, followed by psoriasis (1.85 percent) and rheumatoid arthritis (1.36 percent) among those with health insurance. These three diseases alone affected more than five percent of people.
*In Germany it was not yet known how many people actually suffer from such diseases. Therefore, the diagnoses of 30 autoimmune diseases of German health insurers of almost 69 million insured people in 2012 and of just over 73 million insured people in 2022 were compared and analyzed.
Source: Krone
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