Aussie Health: Diabetes Up, Cholesterol Down, Over 25 Percent Not Getting Vitamin D

Diabetes is affecting more people than a decade before, but cholesterol levels have fallen.

A general view of university students on campus at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia on March 26, 2025. Asanka Ratnayake/Getty Images

Good news, bad news, and surprising news from the National Health Measures Survey 2022-24, released today: the number of Australians with high cholesterol has fallen, but those suffering from diabetes has risen sharply. Many of the inhabitants of the world’s sunniest continent are also not getting enough Vitamin D.

While the proportion of people with high cholesterol remains at nearly a third (30.2 percent) of adults, it has fallen from 33.2 percent in 2011/12.