have no knowledge of

his

whereabouts

.

The Venezuelan foreign minister has said President Hugo Chavez is in what he called a "great battle" for his health after an operation in Cuba. From Caracas, Sarah Grainger reports.

Without giving further details of the president's condition, the Foreign Minister Nicolas Maduro told local journalists the battle President Chavez is fighting for his health has to be "the battle of everyone, the battle for life, for the immediate future of our country". President Chavez left Venezuela on 5 June for a tour of Brazil, Ecuador and Cuba. But while he was in Havana, officials said he needed emergency surgery for a pelvic abscess and

subsequently

time to recover. There's been no further information on the surgery.

BBC News

一项新的研究发现，自1980年以来，全世界患糖尿病的人口增加了超过一倍，现已达到接近3.5亿人，远远超出以前的预期。发表在《柳叶刀》杂志上的这份研究的作者表示，世界各地几乎任何地方的糖尿病患病率都在增加，对医疗保健预算带来巨大压力。James Read报道。

这是有史以来针对全球糖尿病患病状况进行的规模最大的研究。研究人员在三年之内共采集了接近300万人的血样。随后使用高级统计学方法对全球糖尿病流行状况进行评估。分析结果表明接近3.5亿人患糖尿病，比2009年进行的上次评估增加了6500万人。研究人员表示，糖尿病已经不仅仅是发达国家的疾病，很快将成为全世界医疗保健系统最大的负担。糖尿病患病率增加的主要原因是人口老龄化和肥胖率的增加。