Currently, there is a trend of increasing incidence and prevalence of one of the severe microvascular complications of diabetes - diabetic retinopathy, in all countries of the world, including the Russian Federation. In every tenth patient with diabetes, some form of diabetic retinopathy is diagnosed, which leads to significant visual impairment, up to loss of vision, disability, and blindness. Purpose of the study: to review domestic and foreign literature reflecting the social significance of diabetic retinopathy in the world and in the Russian Federation. Materials and methods: data from domestic and foreign scientific literature were used. Research methods: monographic, analytical. Results. In the modern world, diabetic retinopathy is a significant etiological factor of disability and blindness. According to the World Health Organization, this pathology ranks 5th in the world among the causes of visual impairment in patients and 4th among the causes of blindness. The total prevalence of diabetic retinopathy, as of January 1, 2023, in the Russian Federation is 706,407 people. The early non-proliferative stage accounts for 79%, and the late stages account for 6.58% of all patients. According to official data from the federal statistical report, more than 19,000 patients in Russia annually become disabled due to vision loss, with retinal diseases accounting for 25% of these cases, making them the second leading cause of visual disability. The presence of significant "undetected" visual disability due to diabetic retinopathy has been established. The proportion of blindness among patients with diabetic retinopathy who have a disability group for overall illness averages 9.1%, and visual impairment is 16.4%. The dynamics of the structure of primary visual disability in the adult population of the Russian Federation indicate an increase in diabetic retinopathy from 2.72% in 2019 to 2.92% in 2020. At the same time, diabetic retinopathy is one of the most common retinal diseases leading to disability, accounting for up to 8% of the overall structure of visual disability. Conclusion. The analysis of literature data allowed us to identify the high social significance of diabetic retinopathy, which, among other things, increases the global economic burden. The existing regional problems in the organization of medical care to patients in Russia, difficulties in diagnosis and monitoring of the disease, the absence of a system for early diagnosis of diabetic changes in the retina, and the lack of a registry of patients with diabetic retinopathy require attention to the implementation of blindness prevention programs at regional levels through the organization of a new model of medical care that can solve the problem of blindness and disability due to diabetic retinopathy by conducting early digital screening for the disease.