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New Diabetes Rate Up 90 Percent in Last Decade

  • November 18, 2008
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This is an older article that may not reflect Dr. Mercola’s current view on this topic. Use our search engine to find Dr. Mercola’s latest position on any health topic.

diabetes, blood sugarThe rate of new cases of diabetes has increased by about 90 percent in the United States over the past decade. The incidence of the disease has been fueled by growing obesity rates and increasingly sedentary lifestyles.

Diabetes experts said the findings show there is no end in sight to the diabetes epidemic.

From 1995 to 1997, newly diagnosed cases of diabetes were at 4.8 per 1,000 annually. Between 2005 and 2007, that number rose to 9.1 per 1,000 people.

The most common form of diabetes, type 2 diabetes, is closely linked to obesity and has become increasingly common as more people become obese. An estimated 90 percent to 95 percent of the new cases are type 2 diabetes.

The American Diabetes Association said 24 million U.S. children and adults -- about 8 percent of the population -- have diabetes.
 
Dr. Mercola's Comments:
Nearly 8 percent of the U.S. population, or 24 million people, has diabetes, and another 57 million have pre-diabetes, which puts them at an increased risk of the disease.

Meanwhile, these latest statistics show that new cases of diabetes have increased by 90 percent in the last 10 years!

This sad finding reveals just how miserably conventional medicine is failing at addressing type 2 diabetes, which is virtually 100 percent reversible and avoidable. They are failing because their standard recommendations, both in terms of medication and nutrition, are incorrect.

When any disease skyrockets by 90 percent in just one decade, it would seem an urgent overhaul of the current treatment guidelines would be a no-brainer. Yet, most physicians, and certainly most public health officials, will not even consider that their advice is leading people astray.

The Glaring Diabetes Error That Even Most Doctors Don’t Recognize

The concept that is being overlooked by conventional medicine is that diabetes is not a disease of blood sugar. Yes, blood sugar becomes elevated in people with diabetes, but this is a symptom of the real problem, and it is an attempt by your body to keep things in balance.

The REAL problem in diabetes is insulin, and more specifically insulin resistance, along with faulty leptin signaling.

When blood sugar becomes elevated it is a signal for insulin to be released to direct the extra energy into storage. A small amount is stored as a starch called glycogen in your body, but the majority is stored as your main energy supply -- fat. Thus, in this regard insulin's major role is not to lower sugar, but to take the extra energy and store it for future times of need.

Insulin lowers your blood sugar as a side effect of directing the extra energy into storage.

This is why treatments that concentrate merely on lowering blood sugar for diabetes while raising insulin levels can actually worsen rather than remedy the actual problem of metabolic miscommunication. And most treatments for type 2 diabetes involve drugs that either raise insulin or lower blood sugar (which they do by multiplying your fat cells at a faster rate), ultimately contributing to the side effects and the shortened lifespan that diabetics experience.

To put it simply, the treatments just don’t work because they are not addressing insulin resistance and leptin resistance, which are the result of metabolic miscommunications.

If Your Diabetes Doctor Doesn’t Know About Leptin, Find a New Doctor Fast

Recent compelling research reveals that the two most important organs that will determine whether you develop type 2 diabetes or not are your liver and your brain -- and it is their ability to listen to leptin that will determine this.

Leptin is produced by fat and largely influences, if not controls, the manifest functions of the hypothalamus in your brain, including:

• Reproduction
• Thyroid function
• Adrenal function
• Sympathetic nervous system

Leptin also tells your body:

• How much energy it has, and whether it needs more (signaling you to "be hungry")

• Whether it should get rid of some energy (saying “stop being hungry”)

• Most importantly, what to do with the energy already there (reproduce cells or focus on cellular repair)

Your brain and liver need to be able to hear these signals coming from leptin, and hear them correctly, in order to keep things in your body functioning smoothly. However, if you become leptin resistant, the part of leptin's message that would normally reduce hunger and fat stores, and increase fat burning, does not get through to your brain -- so you stay hungry and store more fat, rather than burning it.

Meanwhile, leptin’s message to increase sympathetic nervous system activity gets through all too loudly and clearly, so you stay hungry, continue to get fat, and get not only elevated sugar, insulin resistance and diabetes, but also high blood pressure, heart disease and accelerated aging.

If You Want to Prevent or Reverse Diabetes, IGNORE the Following “Health” Agencies

1. American Dietetic Association
2. American Heart Association
3. American Diabetes Association

For the last 50 years, many people have been following the nutritional recommendations from these agencies, which advise a high complex carbohydrate, low saturated fat diet. Well, by some estimates diabetes has increased more than 700 percent over this same time span, and you would have to have blinders on to not notice the connection.

The problem is that they are continuing to spread the damaging myth that saturated fats must be avoided, while grains and vegetable oils should be emphasized. This is a whole topic in and of itself, but at the most basic level eating a high "complex" carbohydrate, low saturated fat diet for health and longevity has been shown to be wrong. And if you have diabetes, you need to avoid grains, even whole grains and things like rice, potatoes and cereal, to get healthy.

Getting Over Diabetes Once and For All

There are two things that everyone should be doing to avoid becoming a diabetes statistic:

1. Exercising frequently
2. Adopting an eating plan that emphasizes good fats, protein and non-grain carbohydrates (vegetables)

Folks, diabetes is expanding at alarming rates. Now is the time for you to Take Control of Your Health and start a new lifestyle that will make you virtually immune to not only diabetes, but also heart disease, hypertension, and many other chronic diseases -- and all without the use of potentially dangerous drugs.

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