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From: betsy@dartvax.UUCP (Betsy Hanes Perry)
Newsgroups: net.med
Subject: Re: Sugar - harmless, no - deadly, yes
Message-ID: <3378@dartvax.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 22-Jul-85 12:56:10 EDT
Article-I.D.: dartvax.3378
Posted: Mon Jul 22 12:56:10 1985
Date-Received: Mon, 22-Jul-85 21:38:05 EDT
References: <1053@cbdkc1.UUCP>
Distribution: na
Organization: Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH
Lines: 24

> 
> out.  Look at the number of diabetics in the world today?  Anybody have a
> better explanation for this rise other than the consumption of refined sugar,
> caffeine and chocolate (the later having very similar effects)?
> 
 
Gee, I've go a simple statistical explanation:  Before insulin,
diabetics *died*.  Juvenile diabetics didn't live to reproductive age.
Adult-onset diabetics didn't live much beyond the onset.  So the
diabetic population was naturally self-limiting.
 
Today, by contrast, diabetes isn't *immediately* fatal; my closest
childhood friend was the daughter of two diabetics.  (Her mother was
juvenile-onset;  her father developed adult-onset *after* the birth
of his third daughter.  Ouch!)
 
I'm certainly not claiming that this is the *only* cause of the 
increased diabetic population, but it's an obvious partial cause.
-- 
Elizabeth Hanes Perry                        
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"Ooh, ick!" -- Penfold