Nupur Lalvani is the founder and director of Blue Circle Diabetes Foundation, India’s largest patient-led non-profit organisation for people living with diabetes. Diagnosed with type 1 diabetes in childhood, she has transformed her lived experience into a driving force for systemic change, patient empowerment, and health equity.

Her advocacy journey began by creating safe spaces for people with all types of diabetes to connect, learn, and support one another. Today, she leads a community championing access to affordable medicines, diabetes technology, and people-centred care. Blue Circle runs peer counselling services, awareness campaigns, school and corporate education programmes, and advocacy initiatives across local, national, and global levels.

In 2025, Nupur became the first Indian patient advocate to deliver a formal statement to the WHO Essential Medicines List (EML) Expert Committee, where she highlighted the urgent need for greater access to rapid-acting insulin analogues and GLP-1 receptor agonists. Later that year, the WHO announced the inclusion of these medicines in the EML, a milestone for diabetes care worldwide and a reflection of sustained advocacy from patient organisations across many countries.

Nupur’s work extends beyond diabetes to broader non-communicable disease (NCD) advocacy, including intersections with cardiovascular health, kidney disease, mental health, and obesity. She actively advances the dialogue on Universal Health Coverage (UHC), emphasising that essential medicines, diagnostics, and education must be accessible and affordable for all.

She has represented patient voices at the United Nations, World Health Organization, and the NCD Alliance, while continuing to anchor grassroots programmes in India. Her mission is to ensure that no person with diabetes or other NCDs feels isolated or unable to access the care they need. Through storytelling, collaboration, and persistent advocacy, she works to make health systems more inclusive, affordable, and accountable.