The Novo Nordisk Foundation and Heilsumálaráðið, the Faroese Ministry of Health, have approved a draft vision to strengthen initiatives to combat diabetes and other endocrine diseases in the Faroe Islands. The focal point of the effort will be establishing Steno Diabetes Center Faroe Islands.
More than 6,300 people in the Faroe Islands have diabetes or another endocrine disease of a population of about 53,000. The vision of Steno Diabetes Center Faroe Islands is to prevent diabetes and its complications and to improve the quality of life and increase life expectancy for everyone with diabetes and other endocrine diseases.
The Faroese Minister of Health, Kaj Leo Holm Johannesen, is looking forward to the new centre becoming a reality.
“Steno Diabetes Center Faroe Islands and the collaboration with the Novo Nordisk Foundation is a tremendous step forward for people who have endocrine diseases and especially the many Faroe Islanders who have diabetes. We already have a good and well-functioning system for managing diabetes, but now we will get far more resources and better opportunities to strengthen and develop it even more,” he says.
Steno Diabetes Centers throughout the Danish Realm
Steno Diabetes Centers have already been established in Denmark’s five administrative regions and in Greenland. The adoption of the proposed vision paves the way for diabetes centres covering the entire Danish Realm.
“I am delighted that a Steno Diabetes Center can be developed in the Faroe Islands, providing the optimal basis for treating and preventing diabetes and other related diseases throughout the Danish Realm. In addition, some very exciting opportunities will emerge to support research based on the population of the Faroe Islands that, for example, can interact with the positive experiences the Faroe Islands has with the Genetic Biobank of the Faroe Islands and the FarGen genome project,” says Mads Krogsgaard Thomsen, CEO, Novo Nordisk Foundation.
The next step in establishing Steno Diabetes Center Faroe Islands is a project plan for implementing the Center, which will be prepared during 2022. The project plan requires the approval of both the Faroese Minister of Health and the Board of Directors of the Novo Nordisk Foundation and will form the basis for the specific work of realizing the Center.
“The approval by both parties of the vision for Steno Diabetes Center Faroe Islands is an important milestone. We look forward to specifying the details of the Center in the future collaboration with the key actors,” says Martin Ridderstråle, Senior Vice President, Novo Nordisk Foundation.
Further information
Sabina Askholm Larsen, Communications Partner, +45 2367 3226, [email protected]
Katrin Gaard, Head of Section, Heilsumálaráðið, +298 734039, [email protected]
