I realize just a few years ago I would have made sure I had a post up first thing in the morning on World Diabetes Day. Yet today I’m enjoyingan ordinary Saturday. Well, I must admit I have a cold so maybe I’m not moving as quickly as ordinarily. But, even so, while I am mentally marking this auspicious occasion – WDD honors the birthday of Frederick Banting who helped discover insulin -I’m basically enjoying just being an ordinary person on an ordinary sunny Autumn Saturday.

That said, I do feel I have to say something. So here is what I posted on Facebook this morning:

A friend of mine, Elizabeth Snouffer, also a fellow type 1 and editor of the Internation Diabetes Federation’s (IDF) magazine, Voices, related in a recent article something her beloved endocrinologist had said to her which I soooo took to heart. “The call for people with diabetes to self-manage without failure and achieve near Herculean results is cruelly unparalleled compared to other therapeutic categories in disease management.” Amen And so I believe today all of us with diabetes should honor ourselves for whatever we do to manage this disease, and honor others we know with it.

As for the more World Diabetes Day news, here are the highlights from the new IDF  Atlas:

-Number of people with diabetes has risen to over 400 million for the first time – if diabetes was a country population it would be third after China and India

-Half a million children now live with type 1 diabetes-the exact causes of this complex disease are still unknown (we have experts who can talk about environmental and genetic factors)

-Diabetes deaths total greater than HIV/AIDS, TB and Malaria combined (WHO data used for comparison)

-Gestational diabetes (diabetes onset during pregnancy) now affects one pregnancy in seven. This an increase risk of development of type 2 diabetes in both

-12% of global healthcare budget is being spent on diabetes-this is larger than the US military budget. Total spending will reach 800 billion USD by 2040.

-There are strong links to rising type 2 diabetes rates in regions and countries where income is sky-rocketing alongside other factors such as urbanisation (as seen in the Middle East). IDF anticipates that South America or African countries could be the next diabetes hubs.

-The big opportunity: catching the 300 million people at risk of diabetes– there is still the possibility here to prevent the development of type 2 diabetes and bring blood sugars back to a healthy range through healthier lifestyles.