Fighting Diabetes––American, Indian Way

Every 17 seconds, an American is diagnosed with diabetes. ~ The American Journal of Managed Care, 2018

Diabetes is a chronic (long-lasting) health condition that affects how one’s body turns food into energy. Most of the food one eats is broken down into sugar and released into one’s bloodstream. Pancreas release hormones which, in turn control blood sugar levels. Maintaining proper blood sugar levels is crucial to the functioning of key organs including the brain, liver, and kidneys. With diabetes, the body either doesn’t make enough insulin or cannot use it as well as it should. For treatment of diabetes, among others, insulin therapy is a commonly recommended line of treatment, which is fairly expensive.

Last Thursday (July the 7^th, 2022) Governor Gavin Newsom announced a 100 million USD funding for manufacture of low-cost insulin to make the diabetes treatment more affordable in California. According to Newsom (on Twitter): “Nothing epitomises market failures more than the cost of insulin.”

In the US, insulin costs nearly 100 $ per unit. Diabetic Americans spend anywhere from USD 300 to 500 per month for this life-saving drug. Nearly, 80 percent of the Americans needing the drug incur credit card debt to pay for the costly drug. According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, 37.3 million people in America have diabetes. California has a particularly high rate of new diabetes cases—mainly affecting minorities, the elderly, males and low-income individuals, according to the governor’s office. The Californian programme allocates $50 million for the development of cheaper insulin products and $50 million for an in-state insulin manufacturing facility to improve the supply chain of the drug.

Californians will have to wait for some time before inexpensive insulin is readily available.

In India, the story is a bit different.

In quite a few cases, diabetes gets detected only at a late stage. More than the difficulty of access to testing facilities, it is the problem of attitude. Not many people take diabetes really seriously––before detection, or after the tests confirm it.

In India, the story is quite different for another reason––a home remedy is readily available.

On this count, I speak only for myself. In February this year, I underwent angioplasty. The tests I took at that time indicated, among other things, marginally higher level of sugar in my blood. Those tests demolished my high opinion about myself. I always thought that active and carefree people like me (a cross country runner, a Parachute Jump Instructor, …) with much physical activity and reasonably good dietary habits can’t possibly have diabetes. I somehow believed that people with sedentary lifestyles and much burden on their minds were more prone to have complications with blood sugar levels.

My brother advised me to consume a teaspoonful of a mixture containing in equal proportion by weight, powders of seven Indian plant products––leaves/ fruits/ seeds [Amla (Phyllanthus Emblica); Dana Methi (Trigonells Foenumgraeceum); Jamun Guthli (Eugenia Jambolana); Belpatra (Aegle Marmelos); Neem Patra (Azadirachira Indica); Gudmar (Gymnema Sulvestre) and Karela (Momoradica Chrantia)]. He was diabetic and was able to reduce his dependence on insulin (to a near zero level) similarly.

I followed his advice and took a dose every morning (empty stomach) with water. It was bitter as bitter can be, and was difficult to swallow in powder form, but I went through the torture which lasted less than half a minute every morning. And, lo and behold, in a span of less than three months my HbA1c level dropped from 6.1 to 5.8. The feeling of thirst and the need to pass urine (twice) every night also ceased.

A well-placed acquaintance who also suffered from diabetes, couldn’t consume the bitter powder. She got tablets made of the mixture. Innovative! At this point, rather than appending a disclaimer, I would urge someone who understands medicine and has the resources, to undertake a dispassionate control experiment, to ascertain the usefulness of the mixture in curing diabetes.