Welcome beautiful 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, today we feature the concluding episode of a two-part program with highly respected doctors and nutritionists speaking about the causes of, and cure for, this chronic condition.

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.

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.

How would one know if they have diabetes? The test is quite simple.

First you should always get checked by your doctor for type 1 or type 2 diabetes which is a very easy finger prick blood test and something that should be done on an annual basis. But the warning signs and symptoms are going to the bathroom frequently, extreme thirst, fatigue, and things of that nature.

The conventional treatment for those with type 1 diabetes is injecting insulin several times over the course of a day or using an insulin pump. Similarly, those with type 2 diabetes are typically directed to take drugs or inject insulin.

There is a simple solution at hand to the diabetes crisis. This disease can be prevented and also reversed without the need of drugs or insulin injections. With lifestyle modifications, specifically dietary changes, lives can be profoundly altered.

If a person eats a plant-based diet, with lots of fruits and vegetables and no salt, their blood pressure will drop. Of course exercise is important too.

I have thousands of patients all over the world who become non-diabetic, their diabetes goes away, their high blood pressure goes away, their chest pains go away, their heart disease goes away, they don’t need medicines and they don’t need medical interventions. They stay in control of their health destiny as opposed to just taking a medication.

In your diet, focus on legumes compared to cereals because legumes have a lower glycemic index. The glycemic index is the ability of a food to raise the blood sugar in the blood. If there is a diabetes epidemic of type 2 in Western countries it’s because we eat foods that are much too sweet, food that have a sweetness that is much too strong.

In scientific terms, we say that these foods have a glycemic index that is too high. Legumes have a good supply of proteins, and can have a good intake of complex carbohydrates that have a low glycemic index, and a diet high in legumes is the secret to not getting type 2 diabetes.

Stay away from taking drugs, don’t take soda, don’t eat fast foods. Make healthy foods at home, that’s going to be your avenue to live a long life and protect yourself. We’ve been literally brainwashed to think that we can purchase our health by going to doctors and going to hospitals and taking drugs. We think that our health is going to come from taking pills. It’s not true.

There is really rock solid evidence now from scientific literature that a diet based on unrefined plant foods helps to prevent and reverse type 2 diabetes.

Dr. Neal Barnard is president of the US-based non-profit public health organization Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM). PCRM has published several studies about using the vegan diet to control and reverse type 2 diabetes.

Our research shows several benefits of a vegan diet for people with diabetes. Number one, you lose weight, and you lose about a pound per week and add that up, 52 weeks per year, you’re talking serious weight loss. Cholesterol levels fall and blood sugars fall. The need for medication drops, many people get off their medications completely and blood pressure comes down as well.

We have a 21-day program. In one to four days, really one day, practically we get people off all their insulin, and all their other diabetic medications. In two to three weeks, even if their blood sugar started with 500 or 400, returning their blood sugars to normal which is less than 100.

I’ve never seen a type 2 diabetic not be able to recover. Again, it’s a lifestyle choice. Do I want to be diabetic and be out of control and eat and live like everyone else? Or do I not want to be, and become a vegan, exercise, get rid of the sugar in my life, even the natural sugars in my life?

These diseases are all correctable. All you have to do is to live properly; starting with your mind, starting with the food, starting with the movement and strengthening of the anatomy of the body.

Women in general are still the primary cooks in the family. So what we eat affects what our children eat, what our partners eat, even our extended family members when we have family gatherings, and our friends and loved ones. So we are the ones who can take control over our family’s health. You can be the one that makes the difference if you eat more plant-based foods.

My mother became a vegan more than 20 years ago when she was in her fifties. Of her siblings who are surviving in their senior years, she is the only one who is healthy and free of chronic disease – so no arthritis, no overweight, no diabetes, no high blood pressure/ cholesterol, no cancer.

Dr. Baxter Montgomery, a cardiologist from Houston, Texas, USA is founder of the Houston Cardiac Association. The Association offers a wellness program that heals patients with a variety of chronic conditions, including diabetes, through a plant-based diet. Here are two of his patients speaking about reversing diabetes with a vegan lifestyle.

My name is Gene Flores. I had diabetes. I'm cured now. I was scheduled for amputation of my left leg due to an infection in the bone. And for that reason I came to Dr. Baxter and I was cured.

So when you say you're cured, you mean you don't take any insulin or anything anymore?

Right. The first day Dr. Baxter asked me if I was ready to get off my medication, and I said, “Well, yes!” I said, “But, are you sure it's going to work?" He said, “If you do what I tell you.” And I stuck to it, and I'm off all my medication except for one pill. I was on 12, twice a day, and now just one pill twice a day.

I’ve lost 50 pounds since I started. It's been not quite five months, and I’m more active. Just so many things have changed. I'm involved now; I'm up and around; I’m excited, no longer depressed. A lot of good things are happening.

And every morning I was taking about 11 pills and now I only take two (pills) and (vitamin) B12. And it's just amazing and it's better; it's almost three months and it's like my life has changed. I feel so good about what's happened that any time anyone asks me, they get a mini seminar from me. I mean, I'm doing this every day, everywhere I go. Because I'm excited and I want to see other people have the same type of experiences.

Did you have a certain condition when you came in?

Oh yes, I was diabetic. I no longer take any medication for diabetes. And I had been taking diabetic medication for around 12 years.

During a July 2008 climate change videoconference with Supreme Master Ching Hai in West Hollywood, USA, Luke Crosby, great grandson of legendary American singer and actor Bing Crosby and son of vegan Hollywood actress and stuntwoman Spice Williams-Crosby asked a question related to managing diabetes with a plant-based diet.

I have been a vegan for my entire life. When I was 18 months old, I got the Coxsackie virus from a newly vaccinated child and from that I got type 1 diabetes. But my question is, since being a vegan keeps all diabetics’ blood sugar regulated, how come doctors don’t tell people about being vegan, like diabetics for instance, about vegan diets to keep their blood sugar regulated?

Now, you’re right, Luke, I think the doctors should inform all their patients about the helpful factor of being a vegan to cure diabetes, as well as to prevent it to further development. Maybe they don’t know it, Luke. Maybe they don’t know about vegan diet that helps diabetic people.

So, what we do is, we can put this in our website, on the for people to look up to. And you, yourself, or anyone here or anyone out there, please put it on your website as information for the diabetic people, so that they know they can cure themselves by turning into vegan. Thank you, Luke, for the beautiful information and you look beautiful yourself. Your mother must be proud.

To close, diabetes need not be a global epidemic any longer. If we take charge of our lives and remember that plant-based nourishment is the answer, this serious health condition, along with many others such as heart disease, can be made history. We look forward to a time soon in coming where the entire world has adopted the healthy and humane vegan diet.

For more information on diabetes, please visit the following websites:
Dr. Joel Fuhrman www.DrFuhrman.com
Dr. John McDougall www.DrMcdougall.com
Physicians Committee For Responsible Medicine www.PCRM.org/health/diabetes
Tree of Life Rejuvenation Center www.TreeofLife.nu

Thank you for joining us today on Healthy Living. Coming up next is Science and Spirituality, following Noteworthy News. May everyone always enjoy vitality and vibrancy in their daily lives.