Minor public health rant

[wshaffer]

KQED's Forum had a good segment on the rise in diagnoses of diabetes this morning - I caught some of it as I was driving to work this morning. (I think there will eventually be audio available at that link, but it's not there now.)

The show generally did a good job of covering a complicated and contentious topic. But I winced a bit when they opened the lines for calls, because there was a particular subject that I just knew was going to come up. And it did: multiple calls from people who have, or whose children have, type I diabetes, pleading with the presenters to carefully distinguish between type I and type II diabetes, because they're tired of people assuming that they (or their children) are fat, or lazy, or ate too much sugar.

Now, I genuinely have all the sympathy in the world for type I diabetics, who have a crummy condition that isn't their fault.

But I can't help but wonder why it never seems to occur to anyone that rather than asking the general public to learn to distinguish between a biochemical breakdown in which the body stops producing insulin and a biochemical breakdown in which the body fails to efficiently use insulin, we could just stop being nasty and judgmental towards people about their biochemical breakdowns. Which would help people with type I diabetes, and type II diabetes, and mental illness, and all sorts of conditions, and no one would have to learn any endocrinology. Sounds like win/win to me.

Comments

[brewsternorth.livejournal.com]

Give them their due, the government of NYC has made steps in that direction, but alas, probably too few.

And I do wish it were possible to get rid of high fructose corn syrup, in all instances where it's used.

[wshaffer.livejournal.com]

I think the jury's still out on whether high-fructose corn syrup is worse than other sweeteners, but it's certainly used far too often, because it's very cheap. I think we could make great strides if we simply reduced or eliminated the corn subsidies that make it so cheap, but they're so entrenched that it's hard to see how it would happen.

[brewsternorth.livejournal.com]

Yup, the corn lobby is indeed a powerful one.