Welcome admirable viewers to Healthy Living on Supreme Master Television. The World Health Organization reports that globally more than 220 million people have diabetes and more than one million die each year from the condition. In short diabetes is a global epidemic.

To raise awareness of how to prevent diabetes and ways those with the condition can live life to the fullest, the US-based non-profit organization the American Diabetes Association started American Diabetes Month which is observed each November in the USA. In honor of the Month, we feature a two-part program with highly respected doctors and nutritionists speaking about the causes of, and cure for, this chronic condition.

To start, what is diabetes? Key to understanding this disease is insulin, a necessary hormone produced in the pancreas. Insulin helps our bodies utilize glucose from the food we eat to generate energy. Diabetes occurs when insulin in the body is not used properly, is insufficient, or is not produced at all.

When the red blood cells cannot uptake nutrients and oxygen, the pancreatic function starts to be impaired and then the sugar starts to elevate. What blood sugar means is exactly what it says, you have sugar in the blood versus in the cell where it’s used as a fuel.

Diabetes is a condition where there’s too much sugar in the blood. The sugar is glucose and it’s there normally to go into the cells to provide energy, so that if I’m going to run a marathon all my muscle cells are using that glucose for energy. The problem in diabetes is the glucose can’t get into the cells. It stays in the blood, and in the blood it can be toxic. It can hurt the eyes, the tiny little blood vessels of the eyes or the kidneys or other parts of the body.

Type-1 diabetes used to be called “childhood onset.” And in this condition the pancreas, which normally makes the insulin that brings the sugar into the cell is no longer making insulin so the sugar can’t get into the cell. Type-2 diabetes used to be called “adult onset.” There’s still insulin there, but the cells resist its action.

If I had a patient who had diabetes, and I pulled out one muscle cell from their leg or their arm, and I looked at it, blew it up big with a microscope, we’d see the cause of diabetes. Keep in mind what this glucose that’s built up in the blood is there for. It’s supposed to power our cells; it’s supposed to keep our muscle cells moving. Well, if the insulin key arrives at the surface of the cell, and it can’t open the channels to let glucose in, why not?

Well if I look at this big muscle cell, I see that it looks different from a muscle cell from somebody who doesn’t have diabetes. It’s different because it’s full of little fat droplets. Imagine if I have a perfectly good key for my front door, and I go away and I come back and my key no longer opens the door.

Those with type 1 or 2 diabetes may experience blurred vision, fatigue, slow-healing infections, increased appetite, excessive thirst, or frequent urination. Diabetes is very dangerous as it can lead to serious complications.

According to the National Institutes of Health, the US government agency in charge of national health research, one who is diagnosed with diabetes has the same risk of a heart attack as someone who has previously had a heart attack. Kidney disease or failure is a possibility for diabetics as their kidneys are overworked by filtering the large amounts of sugar in their blood.

These individuals may have to undergo kidney dialysis or having their blood filtered of impurities by a machine for the rest of their lives. Various eye-related conditions may develop including glaucoma, cataracts, and even blindness. Nervous system disorders can arise including numbness or loss of sensation in the limbs, particularly in the feet and legs.

As a consequence, diabetics may not notice injuries to this part of the body. A cut on the foot could develop into a major infection because the body cannot heal itself in part due to poor blood circulation, a trait common in diabetics. If the infection progresses too far, a foot or leg amputation may become necessary.

Diabetes is an expensive disease. The number of diabetics who go blind, who need hemodialysis because their kidneys are no longer functioning, who are losing a toe, and then another toe, and then the lower leg, upper leg, amputations.

Those with diabetes face a shortened lifespan. In a study published by the Journal of the American Medical Association, it was found that in those over 50 with diabetes, there was an average reduced life expectancy of 7.5 years in men and 8.2 years in women as compared to men and women without diabetes. What is the primary cause of this condition which is becoming ever more common across the world?

I’ve been a physician for almost 40 years and my viewing of the whole disease process has undergone quite an evolution. And I see many diseases are the manifestation of putting the wrong fuel into our bodies.

By analogy if you were driving a car and the gas tank indicator said empty and you pull into the gas station, but instead of going to the gas pump, you went to the diesel pump and filled your car up with diesel fuel, it’s kerosene and it’s too oily and you pull out of the station. There’s black smoke coming out of the exhaust and it shudders to a stop. What was the problem in the first place? Did the car have a disease, or was it the wrong fuel?

We’re meant to be plant-burning carbohydrate utilizing mammals. We’re not meant to run great bolts of fat and protein into our bloodstream. And when we do that it, it winds up clogging up the system, like the kerosene does in a car. So what is diabetes? As we now know people eat high-fat diets, that fat finds its way into the cells and clogs up the mitochondria.

And as societies become more and more affluent, they want to emulate other affluent societies and increase their meat and dairy consumption accordingly, and get sicker and sicker. And suddenly, we see how major societies which changed their position from being Asian and becoming European or American, suddenly they start having all these diseases that they never had before, cancer, diabetes, cardio-vascular diseases, autoimmune disease.

Diabetes does not happen in all those countries in the world that eat lots of carbohydrates, they eat lots of sugar. They're not necessarily as healthy as they could be, but they don't develop these diseases that I mentioned earlier. But when they increase their animal protein, that's when they start getting all these cardiovascular diseases and diabetes and autoimmune disease and cancer.

Fish has become the most polluted meat in the world. Fish is a meat which has the tendency to diminish life expectancy, as it increases chances of type 2 diabetes.

There are proteins in milk, and these proteins for some people trigger diabetes. Researchers are showing that early exposure to those dairy proteins might be the cause, or at least a contributor to the kind of diabetes that starts in childhood.

No matter how you flavor it, color it, ferment it, whip it, whatever you do, cow’s milk is baby calf growth fluid. It is designed by nature to turn a 65-pound calf into a 400-pound cow in a year, that’s what the stuff is. And even if you take the fat out of it, it’s still full of hormones and growth promoters and proteins that turn you into a great big cow.

I’ve seen it again and again in my nutritional counseling and my medical practice, people love their cheese, I did too, and the ice cream and the yogurt. It’s sold to us as healthy food. So this veneer of health is plastered on it. But it’s still baby calf growth fluid and it makes people big and fat and sick. And in children, may well be a cause of juvenile diabetes. I just can’t see cow’s milk products as health foods.

The rates of type 1 diabetes are highest in Scandinavian countries where dairy product consumption is very high. And there have been several studies linking early introduction of cow’s milk into children’s diet with an increased risk of developing type 1 diabetes.

Obesity, often a consequence of consuming animal products, also puts one at high risk of becoming diabetic. In fact a new term has emerged in medicine – diabesity – to describe cases of diabetes caused by obesity.

Now diabetes mellitus is skyrocketing in the USA, because so many of us are gaining weight. There are two types of diabetes. One is the genetic form that you get in usually under 20 years or at least under 30, often in teenage, seven, eight (years of age). And then there is the acquired form after age 50. Now the acquired form is an obesity-related problem. So if we keep our weight down, we don’t develop diabetes later in life.

Diabetes is a frightening condition, but not only is it preventable; those with the disease can cure themselves and regain their health. Please join us next Monday on Healthy Living for part two of our program commemorating American Diabetes Month to find out how simply transitioning to a plant-based lifestyle can lead us to a diabetes-free world.

Trusted viewers, thank you for your presence on today’s show. Coming up next is Science and Spirituality, after Noteworthy News. May vitality and longevity always be yours.