That's a really important question. It's being recognized now at CIHR. When we submit grants and when we review grants, we are obligated—and I think it's a good thing—to address gender and sex differences.
In terms of diabetes, I'll speak about the two major forms separately. Type 1 diabetes is quite interesting. There isn't really any notable gender difference in the incidence of type 1 diabetes. There are some potential differences, but they're not large. In terms of severity of disease, it may be a bit greater in the age of onset, a bit more severe in girls in earlier onset than boys, but those are not huge differences.
Interestingly, most other autoimmune diseases, for example, scleroderma, have a higher incidence in women. That's not really true for type 1 diabetes, so the question of why that difference isn't there is very interesting. It may be insightful into the mechanism of the disease. In one of the animal models we use, called the non-obese diabetic mouse, a type 1 diabetes model, the incidence is much higher in females. Learning why that happens in mice but not in humans could be insightful in terms of disease mechanism.
In type 2 diabetes, it's also true that the incidence is pretty similar. We don't see big increases. Of course, women are susceptible to gestational diabetes in pregnancy, but usually, after delivery the diabetes resolves. It does increase their risk of diabetes in a successive pregnancy and their risk of developing type 2 diabetes later in life. As they approach menopause with normal aging, it is higher in women who have had gestational diabetes. That's an interesting association, and it again gives us some insight into the disease, but there aren't really profound differences in the incidence of type 2 diabetes between men and women.
Gender and sex considerations must be addressed in grant applications to CIHR now.