Published 21 August 2025.
Publication
Prescribing for Diabetes – England 2015/16 to 2024/25 - Statistical summary narrative (HTML)
Summary
This publication aims to describe the prescribing of medicines and appliances, used for the treatment of diabetes in a primary care setting in England, which are dispensed in the community. This does not include data on medicines used in secondary care, prisons, or issued by a private prescriber.
The Prescribing for Diabetes publication is an official statistics release.
Key findings
In 2024/25:
The cost of prescribed items for treating diabetes has doubled to £1.92 billion over the last ten years.
Patient numbers have increased by an average of 7% each year over the past 3 years.
Anti-diabetic drugs were the most prescribed, making up 59% of items and 75% of the total cost of diabetes treatments.
There were 77 million items prescribed for treating diabetes in England - a 56% increase from 50 million items in 2015/16, and up 9% from 71 million the year before.
The cost of diabetes treatments was £1.92 billion, accounting for 15% of the total spend on all prescribed items. This is double the £960 million spent in 2015/16, when diabetes treatments made up 10% of total prescribing costs.
Two treatments have driven much of this cost increase over the past decade:
- Dapagliflozin, branded as Forxiga
- Interstitial Fluid Sensors, such as Freestyle Libre or Dexcom
More than 58 million anti-diabetic drugs were prescribed at a cost of £1.1 billion - an 11% rise in items, and an 18% rise in cost compared to 2023/24. A new driver of cost growth this year is Tirzepatide, branded as Mounjaro, alongside Dapagliflozin.
The number of patients receiving diabetes-related prescriptions also increased. In 2024/25, an estimated 3.9 million people were identified as receiving treatment - up 7% from 3.6 million in 2023/24, and up 43% from 2.7 million in 2015/16.
The most commonly treated group was men aged 60 to 64. There are an estimated 284,000 identified patients in this group, accounting for 7% of all identified patients receiving drugs to treat diabetes.
Areas with greater deprivation had the highest number of patients prescribed items for treating diabetes. There were an estimated 349,000 more patients in the most deprived areas, compared to the least deprived.
Resource list
Costs and items summary tables (Excel: 343KB)Treatment type summary tables (Excel: 33KB)Patient demographics summary tables (Excel: 220KB)Background information and methodology note (HTML)Pre-release access list (HTML)
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Responsible statistician: Lynn Norris