Diabetes News

As a journalist, I pride myself on being an absolute stickler for accuracy. I always strive to tell the truth and to glean together various sources to present correct information. In fact, for my book SUGAR SHOCK! -- for which I interviewed some 250 experts and sugar addicts -- I and my research assistants double checked and even triple checked facts. What's more, I also obtained signed releases from the people interviewed after they verified their quotes and then submitted them to my publisher, Berkley Books (part of the Penguin Group).

Furthermore, over the years, as a journalist, I've been complimented many, many times for my ability to ferret out the truth and present compelling, accurate information. (People have even written letters praising me for telling it like it is.) In addition, I received excellent journalism training -- I have a master's in journalism from the prestigious Northwestern University.

But while I may have been quite careful about double checking facts for my book, it appears that nearly two years ago, when I was in the midst of researching and writing SUGAR SHOCK!, I did not pay close enough attention to my journalistic ideals before making a post to my then month-old blog.

My oversight and errors were pointed out to me on Friday by Joseph Semprevivo of Joseph's Sugar-Free Cookies, who was understandably dismayed by my blog posting dated July 25, 2005. He alerted me that my entry -- which just recently came to his attention -- contained several false statements and inaccuracies.

Unfortunately, the fact that I was knee deep in working on SUGAR SHOCK! led me to ignore some basic journalistic rules. In hindsight, I realize that:

1. My post entry was colored by the fact that I believed that the sugar-free cookies had made me very sick. It was wrong of me to jump to this assumption.
2. I wrote the entry when my SUGAR SHOCK! Blog was only a month old and it had very few readers so I was experimenting with this venue and did not realize that my URLs would have a wider reach than a handful of people.
3. Although I cited a knowledgeable industry source, it was completely inappropriate and wrong to post this information without first verifying it. Regretfully, at the time I wrote this peice, given that I was working day and night on my book, I did not have time to check these statements, which I've now been informed were inaccurate, false and defamatory.

In the spirit of cooperation and to rectify my previous error, I have now completely deleted the blog posting from July 25, 2005. Therefore, at present, you cannot access my previous untrue statements made by either my source or me. I also now apologize to Mr. Joseph Semprevivo for inadvertantly posting inaccurate, false and untrue statements about Joseph's Sugar-Free Cookies.

I am embarrassed and sorry that I did not adhere to my own high journalistic standards. I do hope Mr. Joseph Semprevivo and readers of my SUGAR SHOCK! Blog will find it in their heart to forgive me for not doing proper research before making such potentially harmful, untrue statements.

This comes as no surprise to me, but children with type 1 diabetes who spent the most time glued to the TV had a tougher time controlling their blood sugar, according to a Norwegian study. Thanks to MSNBC and AP for alerting me to this important study.

The findings, the AP story notes, "lend support to the American Academy of Pediatrics’ advice that children watch no more than two hours of TV daily," quoting lead author Dr. Hanna Margeirsdottir of the University of Oslo.

As many of us already know, snacking and overeating raise your blood sugar levels while exercising lowers them. Of course, it's important to note that watching TV requires no physical energy and often prompts kids to snack on junk food at the same time, especially when spurred on by tempting commercials.

The study's findings are quite intriguing, but now I'd really like to see a similiar study conducted on children with type 2 diabetes, which is hitting the younger set in increasing numbers, as I point out in my book SUGAR SHOCK!

The AP story quotes two important diabetes educators, one of whom is Monica Joyce, founder of a basketball camp for diabetic children where children are taught “they can get much better blood sugars if they’re active,” according to Joyce.

The second expert makes an important point regarding prevention, which is that if the the Univ. of Oslo researchers' theory is right, then simply turning off the TV could be added to the list of remedies “that are very low-cost to the health care system.” (This was according to Dr. Francine Kaufman, head of a diabetes program at Children’s Hospital in Los Angeles.)

Dr, Kaufman rightly insists: “This has got to be the social norm that it’s just not acceptable for kids to be baby-sat by TV.”

Coming soon: Speaking of TV-watching kids with diabetes, I'll soon take a look at the wonderful new book, Ending the Food Fight, from David Ludwig, M.D., Ph.D., one of America's foremost children's obesity experts. Dr. Ludwig is one of those health experts I was lucky enough to be able to interview for my book SUGAR SHOCK

Note from Connie: News, revelations and insights about the Avandia-could-lead-to-heart-attacks scare are pouring in at a fast and furious clip. So, given my demanding schedule this week, SUGAR SHOCK! Blog researcher/writer Jennifer Moore brings you this latest update about the drug that's supposed to help type 2 diabetics.

The FDA is looking worse by the day. Now comes news, as reported by Stephanie Saul and Gardiner Harris at The New York Times, Anna Wilde Matthews and Jeanne Whalen of the Wall Street Journal, and Reuters that John Buse, M.D., Ph.D., president-elect of the American Diabetes Association, wrote the FDA a letter in 2000, warning our watchdog governmental agency about the dangers Avandia may pose to people's hearts.

Dr. Buse, who is also chief of endocrinology at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, wrote that there was “a worrisome trend in cardiovascular deaths and severe adverse events” amongst patients taking Avandia. Dr. Buse also slammed GlaxoSmithKline, the Big Pharma maker and seller of the popular drug, for what he called its "pervasive and systemic efforts" to downplay Avandia's risks and overstate its upside, according to the New York Times.

This comes after news, which Connie posted about earlier on this SUGAR SHOCK! Blog, that Dr. Steven Nissen, the physician who first warned us of the dangers of the now withdrawn painkiller Vioxx, led a team of researchers to sound the alarms about Avandia in the latest issue of The New England Journal of Medicine, which spurred the FDA to issue a safety alert of this very popular medication.

One wonders why the FDA didn't speak up much sooner since they had ample evidence that Avandia could be dangerous to people who are already vulnerable to heart disease because of their diabetes.

Even GlaxoSmithKline told the FDA that Avandia raised the risk of heart attacks in its patients by 30%, according to Brain Wingfield of Forbes.com. Glaxo SmithKline's findings, which was revealed to the FDA back in 2005 and again in 2006, are very similar to those of Dr. Nissen and his team, who said that a type 2 diabetic would have a 28.9% chance of having a heart attack within 7 years of taking Avandia, according to the New York Times.

What's more, Stephanie Saul and Gardiner Harris of the Times reports, the FDA reprimanded GlaxoSmithKline for downplaying concerns about the drug's safety in 2001, a year after Dr. Buse wrote his rather troubling letter.

Predictably, Glaxo SmithKline issued a statement vigorously disputing Dr. Buse's analysis, calling it "unbalanced and unsubstantiated." That's a patently absurd position to take, given that Glaxo SmithKline itself admitted that the drug substantially raised heart attack risk. The pharmaceutical company can't have it both ways here.

To be fair, the Wall Street Journal makes the startling observation that Dr. Buse was a consultant for two companies marketing diabetes drugs competing with Avandia at the time he sent his warning to the FDA. And Dr. Buse has said that the FDA should wait for more data before taking any further on Avandia (though, tellingly, he doesn't recommend the drug to his own patients, The Times says).

But since Glaxo SmithKline itself revealed the drug's potential problems, and a second prominent, credible doctor did too, my inclination is to think Dr. Buse's position has a lot of merit. Glaxo SmithKline, on the other hand, is talking out of both sides of its mouth and has a vested interest--to the tune of $3 billion-a-year in sales, says the New York Times--in peddling the notion that Avandia's risks are overstated.

So while I find Glaxo SmithKline's behavior irresponsible, I'll save the bulk of my ire for the FDA, whose job first and foremost is to protect the public. Apparently, though, according to a very informative piece by Marilynn Marchione of the AP, which The Washington Post ran, the FDA doesn't always discover the risks of drugs it allows to hit the market.

In the case of Avandia, Marchione writes, the FDA didn't require Glaxo to show that Avandia had a clear clinical benefit to diabetic patients, like fewer hospitalizations or fewer serious problems with blood sugar, but was instead approved because it showed short-term improvements in certain blood sugar measurements. She writes that Avandia's dangers weren't clear until Dr. Nissen's team gathered all the pertinent data on the 28,000 subjects Glaxo SmithKline itself used in 42 experiments involving the drug.

Excuse me? Isn't it the FDA's job to make sure to get all the critical information about a drug in place before deciding that it can be sold to a trusting public? Shouldn't someone at the FDA have done what Dr. Nissen's team did, if not before approving Avandia for sale, certainly soon thereafter? Isn't that what our tax dollars go to the FDA to do?

Now, because of its apparent lapse, the FDA will have to answer to us and Congress in hearings on June 6. Additionally, Senators Max Baucus of Montana and Charles Grassley of Iowa have written the FDA demanding that the agency tell us what they knew about Avandia and when they knew it, and why they reacted in a "leisurely" fashion to Glaxo SmithKline's revelations about Avandia's cardiovascular risks, Forbes.com says.

The Forbes.com article also notes that the senators wrote a letter to Glaxo SmithKline, claiming that they've heard that the pharmaceutical giant silenced at least one employee who wanted to speak out about Avandia's cardiovascular risks. (Horrendous, if true.)

I can only hope that Avandia didn't cause a heart attack in any of the 6 million Americans who have taken the drug. What an appalling job by the FDA.

From Jennifer Moore for the SUGAR SHOCK! Blog

Note again from Connie: Thanks, Jennifer, for updating us. Folks, while you're learning about this scary drug disaster, make sure to read my follow-up press release, which quotes Dr. Stephen Sinatra (contributing author for SUGAR SHOCK!) pointing out that if you have type 2 diabetes or are at risk for the disease, you may not even need drugs after all. Kicking sugar, exercising, etc. may be the best treatment.

Oh no! Another nightmarish consequence of taking drugs!

The safety of Avandiaâ„¢ -- often prescribed to type 2 diabetics -- has been called into question by an eye-opening, scathing scientific article in today's New England Journal of Medicine. which finds, from reviewing 42 clinical trials, that the popular drug may raise the risk of heart attacks by 43 % and cardiovascular death by a whopping 64%.

The lead author of the original article is the respected Steven Nissen, M.D., chairman of the Department of Cardiovascular Medicine at the renowned Cleveland Clinic, and immediate past president of the prestigious American College of Cardiology. (Read his bio here.)

Avandia -- also known as rosiglitazone -- is widely used to help type 2 diabetics lower their blood glucose levels, and it is a $3 billion-a-year business now at risk of being drastically curtailed.

"Unfortunately, rosiglitazone appears to increase, rather than decrease, the most serious complication of diabetes, heart disease," said Dr. Nissen in a press release from the Cleveland Clinic.

Every news outlet was full of different takes on these scary conclusions.

• Stephanie Saul of the New York Times weighed in with an enlightening piece, in which she noted that Dr. Nissen was "one of the first doctors to raise questions about the cardiovascular safety of Vioxx, the Merck painkiller that was withdrawn from the market in 2004. His concerns about Avandia were first publicly raised last December in a letter in the Lancet."
• Julie Steenhuysen of Reuters pointed out that a congressional committee has already scheduled a hearing on the drug's safety. "Both the drug company and the FDA have some major explaining to do about what they knew about Avandia, when they knew it, and why they didn't take immediate action to protect patients," the reporter quotes Montana Democrat Sen. Max Baucus, who chairs the Senate Finance Committee.
• Meanwhile, Marilynn Marchione of AP noted that although FDA officials issued a safety alert Monday, they "planned no immediate changes to the current side effect warnings on the drug's packaging." She reports that Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, announced a hearing for June 6 on the FDA's role. She writes: And on the Senate floor, Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, "criticized the agency for not acting more swiftly. "Do we have another Vioxx on our hands with Avandia? I am not sure, but I intend to find out," he said.
• Then, Seve Sternberg of USA Today talked about how nine months ago risks had been raised about the drug in an article with the alarming, but appropriate headline, "Diabetes drug called potential death risk."
• Meanwhile, TIME magazine's Jyoti Thottam offered a compelling overview of the scare and raised some pressing questions in an article entitled, "Is Avandia the next Vioxx?" She points out that Dr. Nissen told TIME that he began looking into Avandia because he was concerned by data from two of the largest studies of diabetic patients taking the drug. "The cardiovascular events were all going the wrong direction," he told the reporter. She writes: "Though the results weren't statistically significant, they pushed him to look at other data sets, including studies by the FDA and from the clinical-trials registry on GlaxoSmithKline's website. Nissen had gathered his data by April 24, and six days later submitted the paper to the Journal's editors."

You now can check out the FDA and drug-maker's responses.

• Here's the safety alert that the FDA rushed to issue.
• And now you can read GlaxoSmithKline's response to the NEJM's article.

More tomorrow on this new Avandia scare.

Coming up: Why don't we hear more about research and success stories, which definitely show that reducing or cutting out high-glycemic carbs (sugar and processed grains) and exercising may be the most effective ways to manage type 2 diabetes?

Fasinating findings were just released by German researchers, who found that fiber intake from grain, but not from fruit or vegetables, may help prevent diabetes.

Huh? Veggies and fruits don't cut back on diabetes risk? This sure contradicts results from other studies.

Anyhow, thanks to MedPage.com for alerting me to this study, which found that there's:

Learn more about this landmark study at MedPage.com.

But before you go boost your intake of grains, even if they're whole grains, you should learn about the dangers of grains here at Mercola.com. You also can read Dr. Loren Cordain's paper, "Cereal Grains: Humanity’s Double-Edged Sword."

Researchers from the New York University School of Medicine have found a shocking 200% increase in hospitalizations for children afflicted with type 2 diabetes, Health Day reporter Steven Reinberg writes.

Let me repeat this horrifying news: There's a 200% increase in hospital admissions because kids have type 2 diabetes.

NYU's research team, led by Dr. Rhonda Graves, examined nationwide hospital discharge records from the years 1997, 2000 and 2003. They found that the rate of increase in hospitalizations of kids with type 2 diabetes dramatically outpaced that of children with type 1 diabetes by- 200% to 15%, Reinberg reports.

Dr. Graves and her team were slated to present their findings at the yearly meeting of the Pediatric Academic Societies in Toronto.

Sadly, childhood obesity is the culprit, as children who suffer from type 2 diabetes are typically overweight.

Dr. David Katz, director of Yale University School of Medicine's Prevention Research Center, says of pediatric type 2 diabetes "a generation ago, this condition did not exist."

"Epidemic childhood obesity has transformed a chronic disease of mid-life into a pediatric scourge," adds Dr. Katz, who wasn't involved with this study. (FYI, Connie interviewed Dr. Katz for her book SUGAR SHOCK!)

If this country needs a wake-up call about how serious a problem childhood obesity is, this study is it.

This study and Reinberg's article make it pretty plain: Childhood obesity is a major culprit in diabetes, and diabetes can cause devastating complications, even in kids.

"I personally know of a 17-year-old boy," Dr. Katz notes, "with early onset obesity and type 2 diabetes, who has already had a triple coronary bypass. If current trends persist, cases like his could become the rule rather than the rare and terrible exception."

This simply has to stop. Connie's book SUGAR SHOCK! presents some compelling reasons for the childhood obesity epidemic (See Chapter 6), including ever-increasing portion sizes, over-indulgence in quickie carbs, and too much sugar, of course. Her book also delves into how that Big Food works to undermine our health efforts by specifically marketing their products to impressionable kids.

But, as challenging as childhood obesity is, we adults have to fight back harder. No one likes to think of legions of sick kids lying in hospital beds, but Dr. Katz warns that could easily happen if we don't act to stop the childhood obesity crisis in its tracks now.

As this blog recently reported, high profile folks like Bill Clinton and Rachael Ray are jumping on the anti-obesity bandwagon. Perhaps this NYU study and Reinberg's alarming story will help to get more people on board as well.

From Jennifer Moore for the SUGAR SHOCK! Blog

A study in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.recently found that a resistance training regimen could lessen the risk of developing type 2 diabetes by significantly improving glucose tolerance in older adults, Anne Harding of Reuters reports.

Researchers at Purdue University, led by Dr. Wayne Campbell, put 36 men and women in their early 60s exercise on machines three times a week, for an hour and 15 minutes per session, for a period of three months. Some of the subjects followed a high protein diet during the 12 weeks, while others had a low protein diet.

The results of this exercise program were dramatic. Dr. Campbell said that both groups experienced "profound" improvement in glucose tolerance, according to Harding's article.

Given that one in five Americans aged 60 or older are diabetic, this research is very good news. Granted, the study is a small one, but the results are nonetheless very encouraging.

Think about it: Older people, according to this research, need to spend a mere 4 hours of their week (totalling 168 hours) to significantly reduce their chances of getting diabetes.

And while the study didn't include younger people, I think it's safe to say that any person of any age would do well to let this news inspire them to get to the gym.

It's easy to feel disheartened in the face of all the upsetting news out there about diabetes, namely:

• 21 million Americans currently have it.
• It's the fifth leading cause of death due to disease in the U.S.
• Over 80,000 people lose limbs due to diabetes.
• Nearly 10% of American adults currently have it

Rather than feel discouraged, why not step up--or more precisely, Step Out -- and do something about it?

The American Diabetes Association will give you the chance to fight back through its annual Step Out to Fight Diabetes (formerly known as America's Walk for Diabetes), which raises more than $20 million a year to support research, public information campaigns, and to aid those living with the disease.

Residents of the 48 contiguous states will get a chance to start stepping -- two hundred cities from Bangor, Maine to San Diego, California will hold Step Out to Fight Diabetes days in fall 2007. Check here to find dates in your home state or town.

Participating in Step Out to Fight Diabetes won't just make you feel good for raising money for a very worthy cause. It'll also give you the chance to do something good for yourself -- namely, getting exercise by taking a nice walk that will be at least 2.5 miles and as many as 6 miles long, the ADA says, depending on where you choose to hit the pavement.

You don't have to be a speed walker or super-fit athlete to walk for the cause -- anyone can join in, even kids in some locations. And if you can't walk, that's OK -- you can lend your support by sponsoring a walker, recruiting sponsors and volunteers, providing logistical support the day of the event in your hometown, or even cheering on and giving water to walkers along the route. (Click here to find out how).

The ADA's Step Out to Fight Diabetes website includes the inspiring story of walker Sam Zaccari, himself a diabetic, whom the ADA credits with singlehandedly raising an astounding $300,000 since the first walk in 1991. This year, he's already raised $14,000 and he set himself a goal of $27,001, one more dollar than he raised in 2006!

"Just get out there and ask for it," Zaccari says of how he's pulled off this impressive fundraising feat. "You're not going to get it unless you ask for it."

Very inspiring!

From Jennifer Moore

The American Diabetes Association (ADA) is getting more active in the debate over controversial stem cell research, which fans hail as potentially pivotal in coming up with cures for diabetes and other diseases.

The organization applauded the U.S. Senate's passage of the Stem Cell Research Enhancement Act" (S.5) last week, which would ease funding restrictions and support research using embryonic stem cells while maintaining strict ethical guidelines.

In hailing the Senate's decision, the ADA's chair of the board, Darlene Cain, lamented that "our nation's leading respected scientists and researchers have been held back ... for five long years by federal stem cell restrictions that have prevented them from making significant advances toward a cure for diabetes and other chronic debilitating diseases."

Passage of the legislation could "bring us one step closer to unlocking resources that could lead to major discoveries in our fight against this disease," Cain maintained, noting both patients with type 1 diabetes who rely on insulin to survive and the nearly 21 million people with type 2 diabetes could potentially benefit from new treatments.

If you've been following the news, you'll know that President Bush has now promised to veto the bill, and the ADA is now urging for bipartisan support from members of the Senate and House to override this veto.

In case you've been hiding out under a rock, here's a quick primer on the much-debated stem cell research.

As the National Institutes of Health explains it, "embryonic stem cells, as their name suggests, are derived from embryos. Specifically, embryonic stem cells are derived from embryos that develop from eggs that have been fertilized in vitro—in an in vitro fertilization clinic—and then donated for research purposes with informed consent of the donors."

The NIH further clarifies. "They are not derived from eggs fertilized in a woman's body. The embryos from which human embryonic stem cells are derived are typically four or five days old and are a hollow microscopic ball of cells called the blastocyst."

Advocates point out that human embryonic stem cells have the potential to grow all cell types, including nerve, organ and blood cells, and since the cells are so powerful -- or "pluripotent" as scientists term it --stem cells are viewed as the key to a cure for a number of diseases.

As you can learn on sites like this one that for diabetes research, access to stem cells and federal funding for stem cell studies could help scientists better understand how the cells give rise to beta cells which release insulin, which, of course, controls blood glucose levels. This may mean a cure for type 1 diabetes and a way to control type 2 diabetes, which, as we're hearing often, has grown at an alarming rate in the U.S.

FYI, last week, the ADA had urged the Senate to vote in favor of easing restrictions on federal funding, which Bush initiated in 2001. Last September, the Senate passed stem cell legislation but President Bush vetoed the bill. The president has promised to veto any such legislation if it crosses his desk again.

Pro-lifer groups are vocal opponents of embryonic stem cell research, and they argue that the practice amounts to "destroying human life."

But fans of embryonic stem cell research believe that their argument doesn't carry much weight, because cells that would be used for research would come from embryos left over after in-vitro fertilization procedures and would be discarded anyway.

So, as advocates point out, the overriding question is: Should existing embryos be simply discarded or should they be used to their full potential and possibly cure serious diseases, including diabetes?

Interestingly, the debate over stem cell research isn't separated by party lines. Nancy Reagan has lobbied in support of federally funded stem cell research in light of former president Ronald Reagan's long battle with Alzheimer's disease.

What's more, celebrities like Michael J. Fox, who has Parkinson's disease, backs stem cell research. Likewise, the late Christopher Reeve, known by many as the first Superman, supported embryonic stem cell research to help treat spinal cord injuries.

From Althea Chang and Connie Bennett