The word 'diabetes' comes from a Greek word meaning a 'flowing through'. It refers to the increased amount of urea excreted in the disease, a phenomenon called polyuria. The commonest form is called diabetes mellitus, or 'sweet flowing through', because glucose appears in urine. It is this form of diabetes in which we are interested here.
Diabetes mellitus, is a chronic disorder of carbohydrate metabolism. It is not contagious; you cannot catch it from someone who has it. Diabetes impairs the body's ability to use food properly such that blood sugars are not oxidised to produce energy. This is due to a malfunction of the hormone insulin which is produced in the beta cells of the pancreas.
Insulin is a hormone that helps to regulate blood sugar levels by taking excess glucose out of the bloodstream and putting it into body cells, either to be used as fuel or to be stored as glycogen and fat. An accumulation of sugar in the blood leads to a build up in the blood called hyperglycaemia and then to its appearance in the urine. Symptoms include thirst, excessive production of urine and weight loss.
In people with diabetes, either the pancreas doesn't make sufficient insulin or the body is unable to use insulin properly. For either reason diabetes is characterised by raised levels of sugar in the bloodstream as blood glucose is not controlled. This can ultimately lead to diverse problems including blindness, gangrene, kidney disease, nerve damage and impotence
Although diabetes cannot be cured, it can be controlled. And research has shown that maintaining good control of blood glucose levels can prevent long-term complications of diabetes.
Individuals with diabetes mellitus fall into two broad groups:
Those who have a deficiency of insulin (type-1)
Those with a diminished effectiveness of insulin (type-2)
Type 1 diabetes
Type-1 is where the cells producing insulin are damaged, so that there is a lack of insulin. Type 1 diabetes affects young people, commonly around the ages of 10 or 12, although it can occur as early as one year and as late as forty. The disease tends to develop rapidly and is severe. In this form of the disease, the beta cells of the pancreas do not produce sufficient insulin. This type of diabetes is called either type 1 diabetes or, more technically, insulin dependent diabetes mellitus (IDDM).
Two kinds of problems occur when the body doesn't make insulin:
Hyperglycemia occurs when blood glucose levels get too high. This can occur when the body gets too little insulin or too much glucose in the bloodstream. Untreated, hyperglycemia may develop into ketoacidosis, a very serious condition. Treatment is invariably with insulin injections to make up the shortfall and reduce blood glucose levels.
Hypoglycemia is the exact opposite of hyperglycemia. This occurs when blood glucose levels get too low, when the body gets too much insulin or too little food. Hypoglycemia is the most common problem in children with diabetes. Usually it is mild and is easily treated by giving the child a sweet food. But if not treated, it can be fatal.
Why Do Children Become Diabetic?
Type 1 is generally believed to be an inherited form of the disease, as it is more likely to occur in people who have close relatives with diabetes. However, this seems unlikely to be true as type 1 diabetes is not found in the animal kingdom either in meat or plant eating animals, where those animals live in their natural habitat. Neither does type 1 diabetes exist amongst peoples who have not had extensive contact with the industrialised societies: the Inuit, Maasai, and Hunza, and other indigenous peoples whose diets are typically low in carbohydrates. (1) While not a single case of type 1 diabetes has been found among the meat- and fat-eating Inuit population of Alaska, there have been cases of the maturity onset type of diabetes. (2) These appear to be the result of increasing carbohydrates in the modern Inuit diet.
As diabetes is wholly restricted to peoples of Western industrialised civilisation, it cannot have a genetic origin, although family dietary traits and lifestyle can play a major part in its appearance within families.
Type 1 is caused by any condition that damages the pancreas's beta cells. One major cause today may be maternal diet. If a pregnant woman eats too much carbohydrate, this will raise her insulin levels. It is not thought that insulin itself crosses the placenta from mother to unborn child. However, insulin produces antibodies that do. (3) Once in the foetus these increase glycogen and fat deposits resulting in an abnormally large baby. It may also predispose that baby to type 1 diabetes.
Conventional approach
The medical profession generally regards type 1 diabetes as incurable. It is managed conventionally with a 'healthy' low-fat, carbohydrate-based diet and daily insulin injections to bring the resultant high levels of glucose in the blood down to normal. This means walking a tightrope for life as exactly the right amount of insulin must be given or it will either reduce glucose levels too much, or not enough. And as we will see later, insulin supplementation is a health hazard.
Vitamin D connection to Diabetes, Heart disease and Dementia
Diabetes is a symptom and not disease
Uncontrolled Sugar Levels even with insulin regimen
Reversing Type 2 Diabetes
Healing beta cells without drugs
