"We think that the earlier onset of severe obesity in young people is increasing their type 2 diabetes risk in early life and pulling down their age at diagnosis," lead researcher Dr Shivani Misra says.

"This is really worrying given the poor health outcomes from early-onset type 2 diabetes."

She says much of the discussion about rising rates of the disease among younger people has focused on ethnic minority groups, which have traditionally been considered at higher risk.

But the new data suggests the trend extends well beyond those communities.

"We now see that incidence is also increasing in white populations too, showing that this public health challenge is broadening across the generations," she added.

Diabetes UK says better follow-up care also needs to be offered to mums-to-be diagnosed with gestational diabetes in pregnancy because it increases the risk of type 2 diabetes after childbirth.

Some studies have shown the chance of type 2 diabetes also increases after being ill with Covid, but that evidence is not conclusive.