I am not a conspiracy theorist, but it is just basic logic. If a cure was to be found, then that would spell billions in lost profits to companies that manufacture diabetic supplies. So what incentive is there for a cure to be found?
For better or for worse, money makes the world go around. I am looking forward to any kind of response that would make sense as to why a cure would actually be found.
I agree with you 100%. I have always thought that about diabetes....well not just about diabetes but about a lot of diseases/illnesses.
I used to wonder about a conspiracy but now I just think T1 is too complicated. I think that scientists don't understand enough about the autoimmune attack on the beta cells and thus right now we need more basic science. For sure, I hope we get lucky with a cure from Dr. Faust or Dr. Zhao but I kinda assume we need more knowledge about how the immune system works (including studies of other immune system diseases) to the point where a cure will present itself. It makes sense that for-profit companies are not investing until the problem moves beyond the pure science stage. For these reasons, I am big fan of scientists everywhere!
There are two entirely separate issues here, and it's important not to conflate them: finding a cure, and marketing it. The two things obey different imperatives and are controlled by different forces.
There are plenty of reasons why a cure may be discovered, assuming it's possible. One is ego. A researcher intent on getting "Nobel Prize Winner" in front of his/her name is motivated chiefly by that desire. Where the discovery goes after that -- or whether it goes anywhere at all -- is not really much of a concern.
Then there are those who are in research purely for the actual love of science, and uncovering new knowledge. Those people aren't usually in charge, but they do exist.Now as for bringing a cure to market, that's an entirely different paradigm, regulated by an entirely different set of incentives. The history of pharmacology is replete with examples of promising treatments that never see the light of day -- or do, and are then withdrawn (think Lente).
I think it depends on what a cure means. I do not believe that there will ever be a "cure" for me. I am resigned that I will always require insulin and I will always be a diabetic. I do not believe it because of some conspiracy, I just do not believe that short of a transplant and some herculean effort to suppress my overactive immune system that will ever occur.
Now what I do believe type 1 will be a memory someday. This will happen because I do believe there will be a type 1 vaccine developed. I see it getting closer every year and I feel strongly it will occur at some point. I believe (there is limited evidence) that it will be found that a virus triggers the autoimmune system to overreact. Preventing that part of what I think will be a common virus will prevent type 1.
I cannot judge how type 2 will be dealt with in the future. If I were a drug company I would take the really big money to "cure " type 2 as opposed to allowing every company in the world to sell stuff like test strips. Type 2 is a different issue because of the multiple disease triggers.
Remember the early days of HIV/AIDS? No one wanted to touch that one for any reason because of the group of people it seemed to affect the most. Even the name first assigned to the disease (Gay Related Immunodeficiency Syndrome) screamed stigma. And it really wasn't until the disease began to affect the majority population that serious attention was directed toward research and education. (Oh, and the magnanimous U.S. "aid" to African workers who suffer from AIDS/HIV? The workers are miners, without whose help global and U.S. corporations would financially collapse.)
Everything, as is said, is relative.
I agree that this is a profit driven world… That being said, if someone ever creates a cure somehow, they stand to make a fortune, and I believe the motivation would exist for them to do so. Would it affect the bottom line of the companies providing treatment currently-- sure, most likely. Just like the automobile put the horse drawn carriage makers out of business, but it still caught on, changed the world, and made fortunes…
Speaking to people in medical companies the going rate is a MINIMUM of 2000% profit on much of the stuff. Look back at none invasion testers, been shown working accurately 15 years a go. Doing final testing due to release in 2006. Bought up by the big companies and shelved.
Have a look at one of the early 1984 Medtronic pumps. Give or take a few tweaks here and there we are using pretty much the same kit these days. Ok screen, wireless things, and software improvements over time. But realistically very little. And how much do these things cost? I've made my own (prototype) pump using better components for under ÂŁ40 by just buying them retail off component companies.
Oh it's a research that costs. Bull! To quote Novo when they announced they were going to open a new research lab in Seattle costing them $60mil to research new insulins...unfortunately getting the wrong person on stage :P but effectively saying they hadn't done any insulin research in the last 10 years and were only going to now to bring together all the things learned from various university's around the world into a product. So no real research themselves other than product development.
Look at artificial pancreas' (well pumps with new software) being demonstrated. Lets double to number of drugs and infusion sets, oh lets add two sensors for more accuracy. More the consumables the better!
Look at the implant systems. All need to be installed by professionals and only last a short period of time.
Test strips are a joke. It's taken government rule changes and the likes of Walmart producing there own to see any kind of slight move from the companies in that. Not huge moves sadly, but some movement.
A cure isn't profitable. No medical company is interested in it no matter what they claim. Making a device that has a nice consumable market is the way to go, thereby they do. In the richer nations we are being milked by the companies for being the cash cows we are, be that the insurance companies doing the paying, ourselves, or the state run funding. In many countries though the costs of these things are so prohibitive that it makes being diabetic a slow death sentence, and frankly I find the companies doing it utterly abhorrent.
There needs to be a new way of funding these things, there needs to be a reason to cure and not to profit out of other peoples suffering!
Nyadach, I could not have said it better!
With all due respect to everyone else who wrote a post, Nyadach is the only person who responded to this blog who gets it.
It makes me sick, but money makes the world go around, and this is another example of that. There is simply too much money to be made off of diabetics. The more I think about it the more livid I become.
It’s almost criminal how BS the whole idea of type 1 being too difficult to cure is.
Once again, bravo Nyadach.
I agree.
My feeling is that the research I find and bump into/about diabetes is always somehow of finding.... new ways of medication, never ever someone who is putting the effort in finding out WHY.
And if you find the answer for the question WHY, then you will know HOW.
No, the most research is about; WHAT for the time being.
But who says, that I(!!!) would not be the one who finds out the cure? Would I then held it away from you, the rest?
If I think like that, then there should be someone who f-ck will do it.
I cannot give up the dream, that I one morning wake up without thinking of the f-king BG. I just get up, pick up the morningpaper and get out something from the fridge without THINKING... just doing it and feeling great.
Unfortunately, I couldn’t agree with you more. Stopped giving about 20 years ago now. I am waiting to see what actually “happens” since half a BILLION dollars has been given to the ALS “Ice Bucket Challenge” (but that is a disease that most people pass quickly from). And we wait…
I think there will be a cure one day. Maybe not in our lifetime, but some time. The speed of advances being made in medicine and science are incredible and the more advanced we become, the quicker the developments are realised.
Diabetes isn’t an unfathomable disease, it has set boundaries, and in my opinion that makes it easier to research.
I used to think so…
Lately seeing how the world pretty much ignored the advent of the first “self adjusting” rapid acting insulin has made me realize that even if the cure was invented all big pharma would have to do is nudge the herd in a different direction and it would never even catch on…
All these conspiracy theories make me smile. I guess it’s human nature to assign anything we don’t understand to a conspiracy. Get real!