Question:
Six months had passed after such treated cells had been transplanted into a large number of mice of a highly specialized strain that had naturally developed Type 1 diabetes. The mice had been cured completely of their diabetes, and showed absolutely no signs of rejecting the human beta cells. (This she demonstrated by a specific blood test carried out on the mice on a regular basis.) I waited and waited for more news on this project. I would follow her subsequent journal articles using Med-Line to find them. Two results: 1) Not a word was ever made again of the mice. I can think of a number of legit reasons this could happen. #1 with a bullet is…. The mice died. That is, something went wrong and their immune systems finally got it in gear and rejected the implanted cells Or, #2 (same thing) the mich had not developed type 1 on their own and it was found that though they could be treated to accept HUMAN cells they would normally reject, IT did not matter because a malfunctioning (TYPE 1 diabetic) immune system would still reject them. #3, The experiment was could not be repeated (not likely in this case I suspect, but still, has to be included on the possibilities list) Someone buying the research off, though not impossible… Is rather far down the lists if only because of the prestige given those who have a Nobel Peace Prize for Medicine on their resume. "Nothing adds excitement like something that is none of your business" Do you plan to run? "Like blazes, first chance get!! Net-Tamer V 1.08X – Registered
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I stand corrected. Useing another search engine, I found a summary of an article from the "Scientific American" titled "Graft without Corruption". The article summary outlines the work done by Denise Faustman and Chuck Coe concerning transplanting tissue on internal organs without rejection. Scientific American, Sept 1991, V265 N3 p18, article # A11209742. I could not find the whole article. I hope this helps someone find it because I would love to read it. Michael Burress – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Having trouble finding the WSJ or Science articles you we’re referring to. I did an author search on the Science magazine for 1991(Faustman, Denise) and a word search for 1991 WSJ(same parameters) and could find nothing. Not sure if it was just my search engine or if the mystery deepens. Michael Burress.
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Having trouble finding the WSJ or Science articles you we’re referring to. I did an author search on the Science magazine for 1991(Faustman, Denise) and a word search for 1991 WSJ(same parameters) and could find nothing. Not sure if it was just my search engine or if the mystery deepens. Michael Burress. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Fellow Diabetics, A few years ago it dawned on me the massive amount of money that diabetes rakes in each year. Diabetes research has been going on since the discovery of insulin, and there no closer now than when they first started! Each year small improvements are made in the treatment of diabetes and it’s complications, but nothing for a cure. I’ve often wondered if someone could be sitting on a cure. Thousands of people would be out of work if a cure was published tomorrow. Millions of $$ in sales of needles, test strips, lancets, meters, etc. would be lost….. I’m curious to know your thoughts regarding this issue. Let me relate something I found to be interesting. Back in 1991, a certain medical researcher, Dr. Denise Faustman, had a report printed in the prestigious journal Science which outlined her experiment wherein she had found a way to strip the material from the outer cell walls on human beta cells which makes it possible for the immunological system to recognize cells as being foreign to the recipient. She described the process in sufficient detail that anyone else with her background and resources could do the same. Six months had passed after such treated cells had been transplanted into a large number of mice of a highly specialized strain that had naturally developed Type 1 diabetes. The mice had been cured completely of their diabetes, and showed absolutely no signs of rejecting the human beta cells. (This she demonstrated by a specific blood test carried out on the mice on a regular basis.)
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I have heard these type of statments about almost all of the major research projects. Although anything is possible I guess I would like to believe that they are not holding back because, even though there is big money and many jobs in the research, if a cure is found don’t you think that there are enough health issues in the world that all those jobs/people would simply move on to other problems. MS, Lou Garrets, Aids. I think, until we have cured everything there will always be room for research. Maybe I’m being too optimistic and I sure would hate it if I found out there was a cure for the common cold! – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Fellow Diabetics, A few years ago it dawned on me the massive amount of money that diabetes rakes in each year. Diabetes research has been going on since the discovery of insulin, and there no closer now than when they first started! Each year small improvements are made in the treatment of diabetes and it’s complications, but nothing for a cure. I’ve often wondered if someone could be sitting on a cure. Thousands of people would be out of work if a cure was published tomorrow. Millions of $$ in sales of needles, test strips, lancets, meters, etc. would be lost….. I’m curious to know your thoughts regarding this issue.
– Scott Hawley
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That is a report that many of us would like to read. I know the WSJ is online, have you tried to find it by checking there internet resources? – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Michel, can you send me that report? It sounds vitally important. Thanks! Susie I now know that I can find the original article in the Wall Street Journal that came out when the report was published in 1991, by using the WSJ Index.
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I find it strange that many people seem to believe that a certain amount of money funneled into a certain research project will produce the desired results within a certain amount of time, as though the answer were out there waiting to be found, and all that you had to do was look for it for long enough. That’s not the way research works — although companies and researchers may foster that idea in order to justify funding. The progress of medical research (or any other kind of scientific research) is simply not as predictable as many people believe, or as we would like it to be. It really bugs me when people make statements like "If such-and-such a condition were true, we’d have a cure for AIDS/diabetes/cancer by now." There’s just no way to know that. This is not to say that I think that the companies doing research always do things the way I’d like them to, or that I think they’re altruistic organizations; but I also don’t think they’re all-powerful. We shouldn’t underestimate the real problems and setbacks that researchers face. Easy answers are few and far between. If you look at medical history, most so-called cures are actually vaccines and other preventive measures, such as public health campaigns that strive to prevent transmission of the disease organism and eventually eradicated it from the population. Smallpox has been eradicated, not cured. No virus has ever been cured. Effective vaccines exist for many viruses — but not cures. There are only two types of true cures I can think of: surgical cures (of which many now exist for various conditions) and antibiotics, which are an effective cure for many bacterial infections. (This may be backfiring by promoting the development of drug-resistant strains of bacteria, but that’s another story.) Revolutions in medicine, like the development of anti- biotics, just don’t happen very often. I have virtually no hope for a cure for diabetes in my lifetime. This doesn’t mean that I’m without hope; it just means that my hope is for treatments that will decrease the amount of time I have to spend managing my condition. /Janet — "A lack of sensitivity is not implicit in a distaste for sentimentality. Cruelty and sentimentality are often quite closely related." — Annabel Davis-Goff, _The Dower House_
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Maybe he needs soemthing different, other oral agents or possibly insulin. You may find supplemental therapies that help, but they are going to significantly treat him or cure him. Art Schor – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Merry said: His sugar is 320 and rising with perfect diet, walking, Maybe his "perfect" diet is perfect for someone else? I would look into other diets. Good luck Paloma
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Michel, can you send me that report? It sounds vitally important. Thanks! Susie </PRE</HTML
At least, put the issue, page #, etc. of Science on here so we can look it up! Thanks. BL
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Michel, can you send me that report? It sounds vitally important. Thanks! Susie
I haven’t seen my copy of it for a couple of years. And thirty minutes of search around here has failed to unearth it. Chemistry labs are bastions of order compared to their offices. Last school year, I was trying to look it up again for someone, but then discovered that Med-Line had dropped it. I now know that I can find the original article in the Wall Street Journal that came out when the report was published in 1991, by using the WSJ Index. Once I do that, I can get hold of the original report. Para cuando?, you ask. Once I get my station wagon back together (today) the vehicle I use to travel to UCSD with, which can carry my 18-speed bicycle (much more efficient than hiking, as the distances to be covered at UCSD without a car span miles), I’ll get over there and do all this. I do believe that it is high time to investigate what happened. Seven years have now passed. In the university world, it is perfectly acceptable to communicate with other researchers, no matter how great they are, via Internet E-mail. I can probably get her E-mail address. I will approach her for advice on doing something technically similar so as not to possibly embarrass her if hers was a project that went sour. Discretion can pay great dividends. Thank you for your interest in this subject. I have often remarked that if they hadn’t tried to cut me off from my medications, I could have been devoting all these past three years of study in the direction of Dr. Faustman’s work. And no, I would never have let anything or anyone deter me from reaching that goal– which would have been a simple, *affordable* method of replacing beta cells in Type 1 diabetics. Sometimes I think that would have been easier than the project I am working on now. However, my current project has jelled to the extent that it now has a time table, and it may be all over with by this time two years from now. Probably then I could turn my attention to the beta cell transplant subject. It wouldn’t be like starting over– just a matter of furthering my studies in biochemistry and mammalian physiology. Best regards, Michel
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Michel, can you send me that report? It sounds vitally important. Thanks! Susie
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- Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Fellow Diabetics, A few years ago it dawned on me the massive amount of money that diabetes rakes in each year. Diabetes research has been going on since the discovery of insulin, and there no closer now than when they first started! Each year small improvements are made in the treatment of diabetes and it’s complications, but nothing for a cure. I’ve often wondered if someone could be sitting on a cure. Thousands of people would be out of work if a cure was published tomorrow. Millions of $$ in sales of needles, test strips, lancets, meters, etc. would be lost….. I’m curious to know your thoughts regarding this issue. Let me relate something I found to be interesting. Back in 1991, a certain medical researcher, Dr. Denise Faustman, had a report printed in the prestigious journal Science which outlined her experiment wherein she had found a way to strip the material from the outer cell walls on human beta cells which makes it possible for the immunological system to recognize cells as being foreign to the recipient. She described the process in sufficient detail that anyone else with her background and resources could do the same. Six months had passed after such treated cells had been transplanted into a large number of mice of a highly specialized strain that had naturally developed Type 1 diabetes. The mice had been cured completely of their diabetes, and showed absolutely no signs of rejecting the human beta cells. (This she demonstrated by a specific blood test carried out on the mice on a regular basis.) I waited and waited for more news on this project. I would follow her subsequent journal articles using Med-Line to find them. Two results: 1) Not a word was ever made again of the mice. This I thought was strange, even if Dr. Faustman was not a diabetologist but a researcher into the workings of the immune system. Surely she wouldn’t have just lost interest in the project, one that could lead to one of the greatest cures in medicine. What happened? Did the mice suddenly start dying? Could this have happened and the report she made became an embarrassment to her? Or, did some rich and powerful arm of dia-business come along and make her an offer she couldn’t refuse (such as funding some of her other work to distract her from her diabetic mice)? I wouldn’t put it past them. 2) The reference in Med-Line to that 1991 article was later mysteriously dropped, while all her previous and subsequent work was retained indexed intact. Hmmmm. (I still have a copy of that article around here.) . . . As for people’s complaints on this thread that huge amounts of money are spent in medical research without any results, may I point out that money doesn’t *buy* such results any more than it buys happiness. Solutions are made by creative intelligence. The money is only secondary, and the role it plays is supporting such people while they toil away on the problem, providing the necessary tools and equipment, and the building space for the project as well. Every time I hear somebody running for office promising a cure for something or other (like AIDS) by doubling, tripling or even quadrupling the amount of money spent on research, I laugh. You simply cannot solve these kinds of problems by throwing MONEY at them. It takes brains and sweat. Michel Martin
I agree with you. I’ve read various newspaper articles over the years about what they’re doing in France, England, or China to possibly cure diabetes (I think they’re more on top of things outside the USA…just my opinion). But then I hear nothing about it again. Would I hear more if I lived in those countries? Maybe, maybe not. The fact is, I think a lot of it is a "smoke screen" for what’s really going on. Medical Research is not "policed" and they can say whatever they want. We take what they say as gospel because we’re so damn anxious for something miraculous to happen. You’re right about the money thing. The Jerry Lewis MDA Telethon has been going on for years and years. Yet, they’re no closer to a cure. Kids are getting new wheelchairs. But they are still living relatively short lives. Jerry seems to raise more than 40 million with the telethon, not including the other donations throughout the rest of the year. My parent’s old neighbor was a retired surgeon. He told me that the MDA has more money than they know what to do with…give to other causes that don’t get the attention. So that further supports your point that money is not the issue here. I’m not trying to slam Jerry Lewis. We have no one holding any kind of telethon for diabetes, which affects more people than anything else, so I certainly can’t begrudge the good he’s trying to do. His heart is in the right place. But even with all the money in the world, nothing really significant comes of it.
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– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Fellow Diabetics, A few years ago it dawned on me the massive amount of money that diabetes rakes in each year.
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you think that some pencil necks and scientists could keep, perhaps the discovery of the century, from the public.
Yup, it’s a fact they did! It’s the same group that had the word "gullible" removed from all the dictionaries. regards m
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I’ve often wondered if someone could be sitting on a cure. Thousands of people would be out of work if a cure was published tomorrow. Millions of $$ in sales of needles, test strips, lancets, meters, etc. would be lost….. I’m curious to know your thoughts regarding this issue.
1) grassy knoll, I doubt it 2) Doctors are too arrogant to hide a cure 3) we need root causes before we can "cure" anything what are they going to cure in me?? I don’t even know how I got it – how are "they" going to cure it??? get real – conspiracies are fun but please read #2 again Doug
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- Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Fellow Diabetics, A few years ago it dawned on me the massive amount of money that diabetes rakes in each year. Diabetes research has been going on since the discovery of insulin, and there no closer now than when they first started! Each year small improvements are made in the treatment of diabetes and it’s complications, but nothing for a cure. I’ve often wondered if someone could be sitting on a cure. Thousands of people would be out of work if a cure was published tomorrow. Millions of $$ in sales of needles, test strips, lancets, meters, etc. would be lost….. I’m curious to know your thoughts regarding this issue.
Let me relate something I found to be interesting. Back in 1991, a certain medical researcher, Dr. Denise Faustman, had a report printed in the prestigious journal Science which outlined her experiment wherein she had found a way to strip the material from the outer cell walls on human beta cells which makes it possible for the immunological system to recognize cells as being foreign to the recipient. She described the process in sufficient detail that anyone else with her background and resources could do the same. Six months had passed after such treated cells had been transplanted into a large number of mice of a highly specialized strain that had naturally developed Type 1 diabetes. The mice had been cured completely of their diabetes, and showed absolutely no signs of rejecting the human beta cells. (This she demonstrated by a specific blood test carried out on the mice on a regular basis.) I waited and waited for more news on this project. I would follow her subsequent journal articles using Med-Line to find them. Two results: 1) Not a word was ever made again of the mice. This I thought was strange, even if Dr. Faustman was not a diabetologist but a researcher into the workings of the immune system. Surely she wouldn’t have just lost interest in the project, one that could lead to one of the greatest cures in medicine. What happened? Did the mice suddenly start dying? Could this have happened and the report she made became an embarrassment to her? Or, did some rich and powerful arm of dia-business come along and make her an offer she couldn’t refuse (such as funding some of her other work to distract her from her diabetic mice)? I wouldn’t put it past them. 2) The reference in Med-Line to that 1991 article was later mysteriously dropped, while all her previous and subsequent work was retained indexed intact. Hmmmm. (I still have a copy of that article around here.) . . . As for people’s complaints on this thread that huge amounts of money are spent in medical research without any results, may I point out that money doesn’t *buy* such results any more than it buys happiness. Solutions are made by creative intelligence. The money is only secondary, and the role it plays is supporting such people while they toil away on the problem, providing the necessary tools and equipment, and the building space for the project as well. Every time I hear somebody running for office promising a cure for something or other (like AIDS) by doubling, tripling or even quadrupling the amount of money spent on research, I laugh. You simply cannot solve these kinds of problems by throwing MONEY at them. It takes brains and sweat. Michel Martin
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Anyway, I’m looking for a simple CURE for this diabetes.
Merry, I agree with your notion that strong and expensive drugs are overprescribed and over promoted, but a simple CURE for diabetes? If you find out let us know. Don’t be too zealous in treating your husband yourself. Yes, diabetes patients are often low in zinc, magnesium, or calcium, but often they are not as well. Giving zinc to someone who is not low in zinc could be harmful. Can you find a good N.D. (one trained at Bastyr perhaps) to consult with? You need some objective evidence that he needs all this mineral supplementation before fooling around with it. Have you read Dr. Bernstein’s Diabetes Solution? I believe his is a sound approach. Good luck. BL
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Merry said: His sugar is 320 and rising with perfect diet, walking,
Maybe his "perfect" diet is perfect for someone else? I would look into other diets. Good luck Paloma
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A hidden cure? It’s much more subtle and insidious than that. Of course, if there actually WAS a cure, no one could hide it for long. But what’s really happening is that the big research labs don’t really put a lot of effort into a cure. They’ll SAY that they don’t have any real directions to follow, so they don’t want to poor money and time into a wild goose chase. But, they’re not spending a lot of time or money even LOOKING for that direction. So, they instead work on what they’ll say is "proven therapies", which really means "profitable therapies". – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Fellow Diabetics, A few years ago it dawned on me the massive amount of money that diabetes rakes in each year. Diabetes research has been going on since the discovery of insulin, and there no closer now than when they first started! Each year small improvements are made in the treatment of diabetes and it’s complications, but nothing for a cure. I’ve often wondered if someone could be sitting on a cure. Thousands of people would be out of work if a cure was published tomorrow. Millions of $$ in sales of needles, test strips, lancets, meters, etc. would be lost….. I’m curious to know your thoughts regarding this issue.
– Louis Sica
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I am also a tad suspicious at the amount of money the medical research field rakes in and yet nothing really comes of it. Cancer, diabetes, heart, etc. Ethics is relative after all. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Fellow Diabetics, A few years ago it dawned on me the massive amount of money that diabetes rakes in each year. Diabetes research has been going on since the discovery of insulin, and there no closer now than when they first started! Each year small improvements are made in the treatment of diabetes and it’s complications, but nothing for a cure. I’ve often wondered if someone could be sitting on a cure. Thousands of people would be out of work if a cure was published tomorrow. Millions of $$ in sales of needles, test strips, lancets, meters, etc. would be lost….. I’m curious to know your thoughts regarding this issue.
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Thanks Jennifer, I was diagnosed at age 10 and am now 32 and have also been hearing the same story…"a cure is coming in the next 5 years". Like you said, they have been saying this for at least the last 50 + years! I’m sick and tired of it! Now I’m having eye and kidney problems. Diabetes if viewed as a "maintenance" disease. Sure it’s maintainable, but the long term effect is what gets ya. Aids research has made leaps and bounds within the last 10 years. I’m positive a cure will be found for it within my lifetime. I don’t think I can predict the same for diabetes. However, I do predict if a cure if developed, it will be a preventative kind of thing that can be administered to high risk people who may develop diabetes. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Fellow Diabetics, A few years ago it dawned on me the massive amount of money that diabetes rakes in each year. Diabetes research has been going on since the discovery of insulin, and there no closer now than when they first started! Each year small improvements are made in the treatment of diabetes and it’s complications, but nothing for a cure. I’ve often wondered if someone could be sitting on a cure. Thousands of people would be out of work if a cure was published tomorrow. Millions of $$ in sales of needles, test strips, lancets, meters, etc. would be lost….. I’m curious to know your thoughts regarding this issue. Randy, I agree with you. The Jerry Lewis MDA Telethon is going on this weekend. They usually take in over $40 million from the telethon and probably more throughout the year. I’ve been watching these telethons since I was a kid and they’re no closer to finding a cure for muscular dystrophy than they were 20 yrs ago. Why? I don’t know. Jerry Lewis puts in a great effort. Yet even though he can buy wheelchairs for more kids, they’re still not living long lives (or getting cured). Obviously, money doesn’t solve everything. Imagine all that can be done for hearts, lungs, and livers. But no one can fix a faulty pancreas! What gives? AIDS was "recognized" in 1981. In my opinion, a lot has been done for that disease. Why? Pressure! Diabetics don’t fight like people with AIDS do. We don’t have activist groups or anything of the sort. We’re a very passive group. I think part of the reason is because as a Type 1 diagnosed at 12, I was pretty much told (by medical personnel) to shut up (if I "complained" I was letting it "control me"), do what I’m supposed to do, and live with it. So, I shut up. But since I never dealt with how I was feeling (if women with breast cancer can be angry, why couldn’t I?), I’ve had to back track as an adult and help myself sort thru the self-esteem, shame, etc issues I was not "allowed" to feel as a young person. Maybe some of you can relate to what I just said. But, the fact is, pumps and better insulins are only a band-aid on a gaping wound. The ADA likes to say, "Cure in 5 years!" to keep the money rolling in. It breaks my heart when I think of small diabetic children hearing that and getting hopeful. I’ve heard it for 20 yrs and some of you have probably heard it for 50 yrs. –Jennifer
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Fellow Diabetics, A few years ago it dawned on me the massive amount of money that diabetes rakes in each year. Diabetes research has been going on since the discovery of insulin, and there no closer now than when they first started! Each year small improvements are made in the treatment of diabetes and it’s complications, but nothing for a cure. I’ve often wondered if someone could be sitting on a cure. Thousands of people would be out of work if a cure was published tomorrow. Millions of $$ in sales of needles, test strips, lancets, meters, etc. would be lost….. I’m curious to know your thoughts regarding this issue.
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The sum of money is in the billions not millions. (8-) If you figure how many of the people are working on diabetes have it, you might have problems with hiding the "secrets". Being born has a 100 percent long term mortality rate. Art Schor – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Fellow Diabetics, A few years ago it dawned on me the massive amount of money that diabetes rakes in each year. Diabetes research has been going on since the discovery of insulin, and there no closer now than when they first started! Each year small improvements are made in the treatment of diabetes and it’s complications, but nothing for a cure. I’ve often wondered if someone could be sitting on a cure. Thousands of people would be out of work if a cure was published tomorrow. Millions of $$ in sales of needles, test strips, lancets, meters, etc. would be lost….. I’m curious to know your thoughts regarding this issue.
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I’ve often wondered if someone could be sitting on a cure. Thousands of people would be out of work if a cure was published tomorrow. Millions of $$ in sales of needles, test strips, lancets, meters, etc. would be lost….. I’m curious to know your thoughts regarding this issue.
I’ve thought about this same thing myself and posted a similar question to the group. It is probably the same situation with cancer, AIDS, or Alzheimers. Think not only of the sales of supplies, but the effect on the world economy in general if whole wings of medical centers or highly-funded research labs became obsolete. The political system would also be bankrupt because politicians would no longer have a meal ticket from those groups which lobby most actively in Congress. My thought was that if anyone has come out with a cure, that person or persons couldn’t be allowed to live and has probably disappeared without a trace, all their research and notes destroyed, their work most likely discredited in the professional community, their friends and family either bought or threatened into silence and they are probably lying in an unmarked grave somewhere in the Mohave. Forgive me, just the x-phile in me coming out. — E. Crystal Cornell "No Black woman can become an intellectual without decolonizing her mind." — bell hooks / * / * / * / * "You must sit in the center of the fire of your own being until the truth burns clear." — Unknown
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I agree totally with your assessment. I’ve been doing about 8 hours of research a day trying to find a CURE for my husband’s NIDDM, but I’m having to wade through all kinds of junk about drugs and more drugs that seem to be the only things being promoted. When we went to the Endocrinologist, he didn’t even know that diabetics need zinc. I thought that was elementary. He doesn’t use ANY supplementation. The things that look promising to me so far are bovine collagen as is found in the product Calorad and also red beans and the water from boiling them. We are controlling his B/P perfectly now with eggplant water (it had been 237/128) and he was on Zestril 40 mg. (20 is maximum dosage) and Norvasc. Now he is off all that as well as Zoloft for the depression caused by the B/P meds and the Naproxin for arthritis caused by the Zoloft. Anyway, I’m looking for a simple CURE for this diabetes. His sugar is 320 and rising with perfect diet, walking, and 8 mg. of Amaryl that he has been on for less than one week. For some reason, his sugar just jumped up 120 points over the usual. So, we went to an Endocrinologist and he was put on the medication and taken off all his supplements which included DHEA, Progesterone cream, Pregnenolone, Zinc, Calcium and Magnesium, and Chromium and Vanadium. His program was good actually, but he had been without the supplements while on a PGA golf trip for 9 days and came home out of control. I’m sure he was eating all the wrong things too. Anyone able to contribute any research into a natural remedy? Merry
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- Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Fellow Diabetics, A few years ago it dawned on me the massive amount of money that diabetes rakes in each year. Diabetes research has been going on since the discovery of insulin, and there no closer now than when they first started! Each year small improvements are made in the treatment of diabetes and it’s complications, but nothing for a cure. I’ve often wondered if someone could be sitting on a cure. Thousands of people would be out of work if a cure was published tomorrow. Millions of $$ in sales of needles, test strips, lancets, meters, etc. would be lost….. I’m curious to know your thoughts regarding this issue.
Randy, I agree with you. The Jerry Lewis MDA Telethon is going on this weekend. They usually take in over $40 million from the telethon and probably more throughout the year. I’ve been watching these telethons since I was a kid and they’re no closer to finding a cure for muscular dystrophy than they were 20 yrs ago. Why? I don’t know. Jerry Lewis puts in a great effort. Yet even though he can buy wheelchairs for more kids, they’re still not living long lives (or getting cured). Obviously, money doesn’t solve everything. Imagine all that can be done for hearts, lungs, and livers. But no one can fix a faulty pancreas! What gives? AIDS was "recognized" in 1981. In my opinion, a lot has been done for that disease. Why? Pressure! Diabetics don’t fight like people with AIDS do. We don’t have activist groups or anything of the sort. We’re a very passive group. I think part of the reason is because as a Type 1 diagnosed at 12, I was pretty much told (by medical personnel) to shut up (if I "complained" I was letting it "control me"), do what I’m supposed to do, and live with it. So, I shut up. But since I never dealt with how I was feeling (if women with breast cancer can be angry, why couldn’t I?), I’ve had to back track as an adult and help myself sort thru the self-esteem, shame, etc issues I was not "allowed" to feel as a young person. Maybe some of you can relate to what I just said. But, the fact is, pumps and better insulins are only a band-aid on a gaping wound. The ADA likes to say, "Cure in 5 years!" to keep the money rolling in. It breaks my heart when I think of small diabetic children hearing that and getting hopeful. I’ve heard it for 20 yrs and some of you have probably heard it for 50 yrs. –Jennifer