[ThrowNSparks]

Rate of Diabetes Cases Doubles in 10 Years: CDC
The obesity epidemic is fueling the type 2 disease epidemic, officials say
Posted October 30, 2008

By Steven Reinberg
HealthDay Reporter

THURSDAY, Oct. 30 (HealthDay News) -- The rate of new cases of type 2 diabetes has nearly doubled in the United States in the last decade, with most new cases appearing in southern states, federal officials reported Thursday.

New diagnoses of type 2 diabetes rose from 4.8 per 1,000 people from 1995 to 1997 to 9.1 per 1,000 people from 2005 to 2007. These new cases mirror the increase in obesity rates, and obesity is a leading cause of the blood sugar disease, officials said.

"The risk factors for type 2 diabetes include obesity and inactivity, and we know the South has a high prevalence of both obesity and physical inactivity when compared to the other regions in the United States," said study author Karen Kirtland, a data analyst in the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Division of Diabetes Translation.

"The message that we want to get out is to promote lifestyle interventions for people who are at risk for diabetes," Kirtland said. "People who are at risk for the disease may be able to delay it or prevent it by losing weight, being physically active and making healthy food choices."

For the study, published in the Oct. 31 issue of the CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, Kirtland's group used the CDC's Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System to collect data on new diabetes cases in 33 states that reported data for both time periods.

The researchers said the state-by-state breakdown, the first of its kind, found that new cases of diabetes ranged from a low of five per 1,000 people in Minnesota to 12.7 per 1,000 in West Virginia. The territory of Puerto Rico had the largest number of new cases at 12.8 per 1,000 people.

The highest numbers of new type 2 diabetes cases were in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas and West Virginia, the researchers found.

An estimated 23.6 million American adults and children have diabetes, but almost one-quarter of them are unaware they have the disease. In 90 percent to 95 percent of cases, people have type 2 disease.

Dr. David L. Katz, director of the Yale University School of Medicine's Prevention Research Center, said reversing the obesity epidemic is key to cutting the rate of type 2 diabetes.

"We have known for some time that type 2 diabetes is a worsening epidemic in the United States and much of the world," Katz said. "We now have evidence that the rate at which new cases of diabetes are developing is also increasing."

Katz noted that southern states tend to have more poorer people than other sections of the country, a statistic that could contribute to the greater number of new diabetes cases in that region. "This is unsurprising, as obesity and poverty are strongly associated, and obesity is the predominant risk factor for type 2 diabetes," he said.

The new report could have frightening implications for future generations of Americans, Katz said. "With the entire adult population of the United States projected to be overweight or obese by 2048, should current trends persist, diabetes is a clear and present danger to us all. That threat will persist and worsen, until we resolve to turn back the tide of epidemic obesity," he said.

As the number of type 2 diabetes cases increase, so does the cost of treating the disease. Reporting in the Oct. 27 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, researchers said the overall cost of drugs for type 2 diabetes almost doubled between 2001 and 2007. Yet, it's not clear if newer drugs improve patient care and results, the researchers said.

Type 2 diabetes is a lifelong disease caused by the body's inability to properly use the hormone insulin to transport sugar from the blood to cells for use as energy. Blacks, Hispanics, Native Americans and Asian Americans/Pacific Islanders are more prone to type 2 diabetes, as are people with a family history of the disease, according to the National Institutes of Health.

Complications from the disease can include limb amputations, blindness, heart disease and kidney failure.

[KCP]

THis may sounds horrible BUT:
I find it odd that we all seem to have a fascination with being slim or skinny and yet more and more people are becomming obese. Is it the pressure do you think?? The pressure to be slim..??

[slipperyelm]

I don't know if pressure to be slim has some kind of rebound effect, making people get fatter. But I will say that as an obese person, a fat person all my life, I have never felt more "at home" and comfortable in the world than I do now. I feel so much less judgment or lack of acceptance than I did when I was a child or in my 20's or even 30's. (I am now almost 50.) There are so many more obese people around that I am just one of the crowd now. And even people who seem to be considered normal weight by everyday standards are much chubbier than they used to be.

When I was a teen, I had trouble finding clothing big enough for me. I wore a "junior" 15 --or 17 on the rare occasions it could be found. Now there are extended sizes available at every store, and even whole departments of their own for extended sizes. It is easy to find large size clothing because it has because those sizes are now common. And I see teens shopping in the same areas as me, many of them getting sizes larger than me, who has only gotten bigger over the decades. Where can they go from here? What is in their future?

I look at teenage girls who are probably50-80 pounds heavier than I was at that age and they may be walking with their boyfriend. My body size pretty much precluded me having a boyfriend when I was a teen. I look at my teen photos and think that if I were growing up now, I would barely even be considered a little heavy. But at 5'2" and 145 pounds I was then definitely one of the fat girls.

So on the whole, I think that Americans have shifted their perceptions. They may know, academically, that a girl at 5'2" and 145# is not likely to be her healthiest, but they probably no longer think of her as "that fat girl." I really don't think there is any real stigma anymore to that height/weight. It is okay, comfortable.

So I also look at the many teens who are as fat or fatter than I was at their age and think, oh my gosh, we might soon be a society of diabetics. How can this be? What has happened? I was diagnosed at about 35; when will so many of these young people be diagnosed?

My diagnosis age used to be considered young for T2. I don't think it is unusual any longer.

I am sad about the idea of more and more people having this T2 problem.

[davef]

Originally Posted by KCP

Is it the pressure do you think?? The pressure to be slim..??

Or could it Insulin Resistance?

Originally Posted by slipperyelm

I feel so much less judgment or lack of acceptance than I did when I was a child or in my 20's or even 30's. (I am now almost 50.)

I think there is less tolerance for people being ridiculed for being fat, but there is still too much social acceptance of it.

I too have been fat most of my life and I'd never wish my school days on anyone. I do however, in darker moments wish obesity and worse things on my school days tormentors.

[Rad Warrier]

Originally Posted by ThrowNSparks

THURSDAY, Oct. 30 (HealthDay News) -- The rate of new cases of type 2 diabetes has nearly doubled in the United States in the last decade, with most new cases appearing in southern states, federal officials reported Thursday.

New diagnoses of type 2 diabetes rose from 4.8 per 1,000 people from 1995 to 1997 to 9.1 per 1,000 people from 2005 to 2007. These new cases mirror the increase in obesity rates, and obesity is a leading cause of the blood sugar disease, officials said.

An interesting analysis of this issue at: Diabetes Update

Regards,
Rad

[enigmalady777]

Originally Posted by slipperyelm

I don't know if pressure to be slim has some kind of rebound effect, making people get fatter. But I will say that as an obese person, a fat person all my life, I have never felt more "at home" and comfortable in the world than I do now. I feel so much less judgment or lack of acceptance than I did when I was a child or in my 20's or even 30's. (I am now almost 50.) There are so many more obese people around that I am just one of the crowd now. And even people who seem to be considered normal weight by everyday standards are much chubbier than they used to be.

When I was a teen, I had trouble finding clothing big enough for me. I wore a "junior" 15 --or 17 on the rare occasions it could be found. Now there are extended sizes available at every store, and even whole departments of their own for extended sizes. It is easy to find large size clothing because it has because those sizes are now common. And I see teens shopping in the same areas as me, many of them getting sizes larger than me, who has only gotten bigger over the decades. Where can they go from here? What is in their future?

I look at teenage girls who are probably50-80 pounds heavier than I was at that age and they may be walking with their boyfriend. My body size pretty much precluded me having a boyfriend when I was a teen. I look at my teen photos and think that if I were growing up now, I would barely even be considered a little heavy. But at 5'2" and 145 pounds I was then definitely one of the fat girls.

So on the whole, I think that Americans have shifted their perceptions. They may know, academically, that a girl at 5'2" and 145# is not likely to be her healthiest, but they probably no longer think of her as "that fat girl." I really don't think there is any real stigma anymore to that height/weight. It is okay, comfortable.

So I also look at the many teens who are as fat or fatter than I was at their age and think, oh my gosh, we might soon be a society of diabetics. How can this be? What has happened? I was diagnosed at about 35; when will so many of these young people be diagnosed?

My diagnosis age used to be considered young for T2. I don't think it is unusual any longer.

I am sad about the idea of more and more people having this T2 problem.

You and I seem to have had very similar experiences. I too, am almost 50, and when I was a child and teenager, I was "chubby", then "overweight".

As a teenager, I also remember not being able to find clothing to fit me unless my parents were willing to take me to Lane Bryant, which they weren't willing to do because it was much more expensive than Sears or Penneys. So I had one or two pairs of jeans and had to settle for "grandma" pants to wear since nothing else fit me! How embarrassing this was for a 14 year old! Boyfriends? I didn't have any either - until I started college and lost weight.

I have one memory in particular that still haunts me to this day; I was 14 years old, in junior high. The school was having a contest to find the girl with the "best posture" - it was tied into a screening they were doing to check all the kids for scoliosis, weight problems, etc.

Well, as you can imagine, I, at 5 foot 7 and weighing 160 pounds at the time,(which by today's standards is probably considered "average") was one of the few (if not ONLY) overweight kids. The screening was done during PE class in which we all had to get on scales, and then have our backs checked for spinal abnormalities. I step on the scale, the stupid PE teacher announces the weight, then tells me that I am a "weak" person. She asks me how I could care about keeping my nails painted but not care about my weight!

Can you say "mortified"???

When I look at it now, most of the kids today are indeed heavier than I was back in those days. Do they ridicule these kids to try to get them to lose weight? I doubt it very much.

The other thing that I have to say is that when I was in junior high and high school, we had a good old fashioned cafeteria to purchase our lunches in if we didn't want to brown bag it. I was astounded to find out when my own two daughters were in high school that many of the popular fast food outlets had a presence RIGHT ON THE SCHOOL CAMPUSES! Well, no wonder these kids are fat!!! Which would you pick as a teenager - the cafeteria salisbury steak with green beans or the Big Mac with a large order of fries and a coke??????

I definitely agree that I am much more part of the "majority" today than I was as a kid and teenager.

[slipperyelm]

With Rad's link, I am reminded to say that despite my reply that focused on my teenage weight and the weight of teens nowadays, I am open to the possibility that excess weight is not the cause of diabetes in overweight diabetics. Undeniably, though, there is correlation. The blog Rad linked mentioned the possibility to bisphenols or other synthetic substances being a cause. I have wondered about such things.