Here’s the question:
In the United States, what do over 20.8 million people have that they pay over $132 billion each year to keep?
Here’s the answer:
Diabetes!
Fact:
- Based upon a 2002 study, 20.8 million people, or 7% of the entire U.S. population, are living with diabetes. This disease affects 10.9 million men, 9.7 million women and 1 in every 400 children. These numbers have grown over the last 6 years and continue growing today.
- Direct medical costs (i.e. medications, medical supplies, doctor/hospital visits, etc.) are estimated at over $92 billion annually.
- Indirect costs (i.e. disability, loss of earnings, premature mortality, etc.) are estimated at over $40 billion.
- The cost of human pain & suffering and the bereavement of family and loved ones? …you decide what it’s worth.
|
|
Here’s the question:
Why is diabetes so expensive?
Here’s the answer:
Because powerful and influential groups of people like it that way.
Fact:
- Diabetes is big business. The disease generates billions of dollars in profits each year. Insulin alone accounts for $10.2 billion in annual sales. It is a major cash cow for big pharmaceutical companies, insurance companies and medical providers.
- It also sustains “not-for-profits” like the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF), which is the world's leading not-for-profit organization with the mission statement of curing Type I diabetes
— an organization that ultimately funds and controls over 90% of the scientific research in the field. In 2007, the JDRF received $228.7 million in donated funds and had administrative operating costs of $15.4 million.
- A significant portion of funded research is "maintenance” based, not cure-based. In other words, it focuses on how diabetics can better "live with" the disease rather than how it may be cured. You are probably asking, “How or why would anyone pour valuable resources into maintaining a disease that is leading people to early deaths?” ...because “maintaining” the disease equals maintaining profits …at the expense of human lives.
- There has been an overall shift in allocation of research dollars into "industrial" research conducted by "for-profit" biotech and pharmaceutical companies. These companies of course consider their own profit motives first, which is an inherent conflict of interest. The JDRF was cited as an example of a not-for-profit organization that has shifted a significant amount of funding into this type of "for-profit" research.
- Curing diabetes represents major revenue losses for big pharmaceutical companies and insurance companies, as well as the demise of medical provider businesses and not-for-profits whose whole existence is based upon this disease. These wealthy and powerful entities are a strong lobby in Washington and contribute millions to political parties to protect their own financial interests and existences.
|
|
Here’s the question:
If they can put a man on the moon, why can’t someone cure diabetes?
Here’s the answer:
Someone can, but they can’t get the funding to do it.
Fact:
- The most promising cure-based research cannot secure funding from traditional sources because it’s “bad for business.”
- One of the most promising studies is currently underway at Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Medical School. Dr. Denise Faustman and her immunobiology team have achieved an almost 100% success rate in fully reversing (yes, I said FULLY REVERSING!) end-stage Type I diabetes in non-obese, diabetic laboratory mice. The reversal has been complete and permanent—normal insulin production by the pancreas has resumed naturally and diabetic complications have abated without intervention.
- Although other scientists have "cured" diabetes in laboratory mice with varying degrees of success, it has predominately been with newly-diagnosed or "honeymoon phase" cases, and the reversal was usually short-lived. Many of these other studies have also included undesirable companion procedures such as immuno-suppressive drug treatments and/or islet cell transplants.
- Dr. Faustman's lab is now conducting Phase I human trials in which the preliminary collection and study of human blood samples is underway.
- This is mostly thanks to the grassroots fundraising efforts of The Iacocca Foundation—an organization founded by Lee Iacocca after losing his wife to diabetic complications at age 57. The foundation’s sole mission is to cure diabetes. Dr. Faustman’s findings were so impressive that it launched its “Join Lee Now” campaign to raise these funds from ordinary citizens without the support of pharmaceutical companies or the JDRF.
- In fact, rather than fund Dr. Faustman’s human trials, the JDRF elected to fund three independent studies to replicate her findings in mice. After these (as well as other independent studies) validated her findings, and following numerous accolades for her research, the JDRF has still denied her request to fund Phase II of the human trials, seemingly in an effort to discredit her groundbreaking work.
|
|
Here’s the question:
What does all of this have to do with me?
Here’s the answer:
Everything.
Fact:
- Diabetes is reaching epidemic proportions. The incidence of people afflicted with the disease is dramatically increasing in every age group. Almost invariably, we all have a family member or loved one living with this disease and the havoc it wreaks. It is nearly impossible to find a person who is not effected in some way. It is costing us billions in health care for uninsured or underinsured people, as well as social services. It is decimating the health and well-being of individuals and their families. Most disturbingly, there are extremely powerful and influential forces that be are blocking the path to a cure at our expense and ultimately with diabetics’ lives.
|
|
Here’s the question:
So, what can I do?
Here’s the answer:
Tell them you won’t stand for it anymore!
Fact:
- Get involved, get organized and show them you mean business! A single letter or phone call carries less weight than an organized call-in campaign, e-mail blitz, or petition.
- Politicians care about re-election. Tell them that this is an issue you feel very strongly about, and they do not have your vote unless they support cure-based research (with real funding, not just campaign promises). If they hear it from enough voters, they will listen and take action.
- Grassroots support and awareness is the key. Turn this from a personal issue into a “cause.” Ordinary people are reluctant to get into your personal business, but they are ready and willing to champion a cause. They will get behind it by volunteering their time and donating their money.
- Spread the word any way you can; tell family, friends and colleagues; make phone calls, send e-mails, and write letters to politicians and the media; talk it up!
|
|
Here’s the question:
When and where do I start?
Here’s the answer:
Right here and right now.
Fact:
Every caring person can help. Every individual has something valuable and unique to contribute to the cause. Every single voice makes a difference. Every moment counts...
|
|
Some general information about the disease:
|
Here’s the question:
What is diabetes?
Here’s the answer:
Diabetes is the body’s inability to control its own glucose (blood sugar) levels due to defects in insulin production, insulin resistance, or both. Insulin is a hormone naturally produced by your pancreas.
Fact: Diabetes can lead to serious complications. Complications include:
- Heart disease – deaths from heart disease and strokes are 2 to 4 times higher in diabetics than non-diabetics and account for about 65% of all diabetic deaths.
- High blood pressure – 73% of adult diabetics have a blood pressure greater than 130/80.
- Blindness – diabetes causes 12,000 to 24,000 new cases of blindness each year, more than any other disease.
- Kidney failure – it is also the leading cause of kidney failure, accounting for 44% of all new cases.
- Nerve damage – 60 to 70% of diabetics have suffered nerve damage that impairs sensation.
- Amputation – over 60% of non-traumatic lower-limb amputations are performed on diabetics. There were 82,000 in 2002 alone.
- Pregnancy Complications – including major birth defects in up to 10% and spontaneous abortions in up to 20% of diabetic pregnancies.
Fact: Diabetes can lead to premature death:
- According to U.S. death certificates filed in 2002, diabetes is the sixth leading cause of death, contributing to 224,092 deaths.
- This is an underreported figure since 60 to 65% of diabetics had no reference to diabetes on their death certificates at all. Causes of death are generally listed as the complications that resulted from the diabetes, and not the diabetes itself.
- Including these cases would perhaps elevate diabetes to the #1 killer in the U.S.
- Diabetics generally age 1 ½ years for every year they live with the disease, and their life spans are shortened by an average of 10 years.
- The overall risk of premature death for diabetics is double that of people without diabetes.
|
|
Here’s the question:
Is diabetes the same for everyone?
Here’s the answer:
No. There are 2 major types of diabetes:
- Type I (also know as insulin-dependent or juvenile-onset diabetes) is an autoimmune disorder in which the body’s immune system produces antibodies that attack and destroy the body’s insulin producing cells much the same way it would attack a virus. Thus, the body becomes incapable of producing enough insulin to control its own blood sugar, requiring daily insulin injections (4 per day on average) to survive. Although onset can occur at any age, it predominately strikes children and adolescents and accounts for approximately 10% of all diagnosed cases of diabetes. Type I is generally regarded as the more “severe” form of the disease.
- Type II (also known as non-insulin-dependent or adult-onset diabetes) usually begins with a syndrome known as “insulin resistance” in which the body’s cells do not use insulin properly. The body’s ever-increasing demand for insulin exhausts the pancreas, and the body’s ability to produce it eventually wanes. Typical characteristics are older age, obesity, heredity, physical inactivity and race/ethnicity. Historically, Type II diabetes in children and adolescents was extremely rare; however, soaring rates of obesity and inactivity among children have dramatically increased the incidence of Type II in this age group over the last decade.
|
|
|
