Saying Type 2 Diabetes Reversal isn’t possible is untrue and unethical
Imagine living with HIV/AIDS today and not being told that you have access to a life saving treatment - that’d be unethical, right? Unfortunately many people living with Type 2 Diabetes are told that they’re living with such a life sentence without a parole — a progressive and debilitating disease that only gets worse over time. That is not true. Type 2 Diabetes[1] can be reversed and it has now been shown in multiple studies and written about in many medical journals.
I am determined to inform the millions of people suffering from T2D that their disease path can be changed. They can get off the one way street which is the current perception of T2D and create a new street — one that goes in the opposite direction.
T2D has historically been seen as a chronic and progressive disease. The main symptom is chronically elevated blood glucose which leads to microvascular (e.g. blindness, kidney disease) and macrovascular (e.g. heart disease and strokes) complications which cause people who suffer from T2D to die an average of nearly a decade younger than their counterparts without the disease. In fact, nearly 1,000 people die every day directly or indirectly due to diabetes in the U.S. alone and nearly half a billion — and growing — people suffer from T2D globally!
Historically, the best in class treatment protocol for T2D has been an ever-increasing dose of diabetes drugs that often end with insulin being used to bring blood sugar down. The hope of this plan is to slow down the progression of the disease and its complications — and, of course, trying to prevent early death. These diabetes drugs do not solve the actual problem. They may in fact, slow the one way progression, but it is only temporary. Almost always the inevitable will occur —complications from the T2D and the need for even more medications.
Good news: Type 2 diabetes can be sustainably reversed and patients can be made healthy and blood sugar brought down to non-diabetic levels and, for most, the need for all diabetes specific medications can be eliminated. One can argue about semantics, but that is beyond the main point: a person previously diagnosed with T2D can sustainably achieve healthy blood sugar levels and improvement in other related biomarkers[2] without the use of any diabetes specific medications! This T2D reversal experience is life-changing beyond “getting sugar under control”, to say the least, for most people.
Therefore, to claim that T2D is a life-sentence and can not be reversed, as I still sometimes hear, is unethical — or problematic at best — for at least two reasons:
- Reversal has been shown in multiple studies[3] published in the peer reviewed medical literature. And, again, whether this state is called “reversal” or “remission” is beyond the point. What matters is that T2D does not have to be a chronic and progressive disease where the only solution is to suffer from it; hoping you can delay life-threatening complications with an ever increasing dose of diabetes drugs. Type 2 diabetes is not a life sentence.
- It is about knowingly denying the truth from patients. Imagine living with a deadly disease, such as HIV/AIDS and not being told that you have access to a life saving treatment. I’ve personally experienced the anger from dozens of Virta Health patients who have reversed their T2D — sometimes within months — after a decade(s) long struggle with T2D and daily use of insulin (example, 26-year U.S. Veteran Ron). Their anger is not about reversing their T2D, but that they suffered for so long without knowing any better. Even worse is that many have previously lost their parents to T2D which may have been preventable.
One might ask, why would anyone have a reason to claim that T2D cannot be reversed (assuming it isn’t just about semantics and terminology)? That is a good question. It is important to realize that T2D is about a $400 Billion a year problem in the U.S. That’s a lot of money to go around. There are certainly economic forces in play. Despite the why, the thing we need to do now is spread the word. Type 2 diabetes can and will be reversed. The truth will prevail and I’m on a mission to make sure it happens soon — to millions more Kim’s!
[1] Note: We are only talking about Type 2 Diabetes here, which accounts for more than 90% of all diabetes cases in the U.S. And unlike T2D, Type 1 diabetes does not yet have a known cure and can not be “reversed” or put into “remission” yet. Many smart scientists are, thankfully, working on T1D cure as well.
[2] Note: In the Virta Health prospective clinical trial, we’ve demonstrated that in addition to lowering blood sugar (A1C) to a non-diabetic level while eliminating all diabetes specific medications, also insulin resistance (HOMA-IR), fasting insulin, triglycerides, total cardiovascular risk, obesity and blood pressure were substantially improved.
[3] Note: Multiple prospective clinical trials have demonstrated that patient with diagnosed T2D, even those on insulin, have been able to eliminate the need for these drugs while achieving non-diabetic blood sugar levels (e.g. A1C). Virta Health has achieved this nutritionally and several studies show the same with bariatric surgery.
