You'll have to forgive the bad-quality video taken on the spur of the moment on my old Sony camera tonight, but I caught this story on the local (Minneapolis) news tonight. It is hard to believe that there might be an actual CURE for type 1 diabetes in 2013. I had to upload the video to Youtube because it was too big of a file to download anywhere else. It's about 5 minutes long, and you'll hear me lose it (sobs) about 4 1/2 minutes through it (sorry, didn't know the sound would pick that up). I am still getting teary-eyed even talking about the prospect of an actual cure; something we've all hoped for; something we hoped would happen in our lifetime. Who knew it could be this soon?
Happy day, people.
Click HERE for the video.
It is amazing. And HOPE is a beautiful thing.
ReplyDeleteI loved that the news guy has T1 himself! That was awesome :)
Maybe I'm jaded, but islet transplant doesn't fit my definition of a cure. I'm not sure I'm willing to trade insulin for a lifetime of immunosuppressant drugs...not to mention the risks associated with rejection and long term side effects.
It IS exciting stuff...I AM grateful for the doctors who are dedicated to T1 research, and the people who are willing to be test subjects.
But we've been waiting for the FDA to approve insulin technology for YEARS on end. The rest of the world has access to technology (Animas Vibe, Low Glucose Suspend feature) that our FDA is still sitting on. This technology was created, HERE, in the U.S., but we haven't been able to access it FOR YEARS, because our government agency hasn't deemed it safe yet.
There's no way this will be through the FDA (let alone, have widespread insurance support -- like THAT will ever happen) by 2013...and I doubt it will ever be made available to anyone under the age of 18.
Insurance companies argue about paying for a test strip. I doubt they'll be throwing out the money for a procedure like this, plus all the follow up, plus the lifetime supply of drugs to prevent a deadly immune reaction.
Insulin is much cheaper.
Sorry to be a Debbie Downer. I've been listening to all this "cure chatter" for over 6 years now.
Meanwhile, I can't help but to wonder...with all the BILLIONS of dollars that has been spent on all this research...globally, how many people have died because they couldn't access the insulin they needed to survive? Helping everyone who needs insulin access insulin should be a higher priority than taking islets from pigs.
IMHO, of course.
This is very exciting research, but honestly that story bothered me. I really don't like the way they describe this as some cure-all only two years away... when it's really not that simple or even realistic.
ReplyDeleteI personally also don't see it as a cure... possibly one piece of the bigger picture. For one thing, this isn't something for every Person With Diabetes - you must be eligible for it. Assuming that you are, the success rate is good at first. Within a year, about 40% of patients are still insulin free and that drops to about 17% after three years. By five, it's 10%. The costs of this, at the moment, are also incredibly high not only for the procedure but then the lifetime of immunosuppresent drugs that are required. I think this COULD be one of the handful of avenues used to eradicate diabetes - prevention is necessary. Then, you'd only need this to get at those already diagnosed and possibly beta cell regeneration could also do the job. Eventually, it'd be like polio and it would be "cured" by the fact that it's no longer visible. Unless we get at the causes and prevention, we will never "cure" diabetes but will only have treatments.
Also: This is a really good fellow D-blogger who's gone through this, and is about three years in post-islet cell - http://kathy-mynewislets.blogspot.com.