Imbalance in Life

 Ryan Koch

Curated Paper #1

October 8, 2020

Imbalance in Life

            Look around at the many complex organisms that live life within their specialized niche. Think of the water cycle that provides life-giving water to the many organisms living on land or the balance between photosynthesis and cellular respiration that provide each other their necessary reactants. Life is all about balance. When an imbalance occurs, problems soon follow. For instance, the combustion of fossil fuels has led to an increase in carbon dioxide that photosynthetic organisms cannot keep in balance. This imbalance is leading to climate change with all its disastrous effects.

            One of the major imbalances facing humankind currently is the obesity pandemic. According to a 2016 estimation performed by the World Health Organization, 13 percent of the world’s population is classified as obese. That is over one in ten people alive today! What is even more staggering is that this prevalence of obesity has had almost a 3-fold increase from 1975 to 2016. The article lists the possible causes for this rapid increase as a decrease in physical exercise and an increase consumption of energy-dense food that are high in fats and sugars. This imbalance in our body’s metabolism is not without its negative consequences. The WHO article lists out the many diseases and conditions that are caused by an increased BMI. Among those on the list are heart disease, stroke, diabetes, musculoskeletal disorders, and even some types of cancer (Obesity and Overweight, 2020).

            Let us dive deeper into the topic of diabetes specifically as it is widespread in modern society, yet rarely discussed. This disease itself is an imbalance in the human body. Diabetes occurs when the body cannot control the glucose levels in the blood due to the inability to make insulin or a high resistance to it. Over 346 million people worldwide alone have type 2 diabetes. Fluctuating glucose levels are not the only imbalances involved with diabetes. There are also countless social, economic, and mental imbalances caused by diabetes.

            In a 2013 article, researchers calculated that the full economic cost of diabetes is a staggering $245 billion to Americans in 2012 alone. This equated to the average American diagnosed with diabetes paying $13,700 in medical expenses each year. This total economic cost of diabetes increased by an unsustainable 41% from 2007 to 2012 (Economic Costs of Diabetes in the U.S. in 2012, 2013). An article by the BBC further supported this statistic by focusing on the rising cost of insulin in the United States. Researchers sold their patent for insulin in 1923 for $1 with the hope that it would be affordable everyone. Now, the three major brands of insulin cost around $300 a vial. A study performed by the ADA found that prices of major insulin brands from 2007 to 2016 increased by 252%, while people in other countries still pay as little as $19 a vial (Prasad, 2019).

            The social and mental effects of the imbalance caused by diabetes is just as alarming. A group of researchers tested whether blood glucose levels correlated to the levels of self-control. The four small tests which were performed showed a negative correlation. First, they showed that those who drank a sugary drink were less aggressive than those who drank a placebo. Next, they found a link between diabetes and lower self-control. For the next test, they found those with diabetes had higher rates of violent crimes. Lastly, the researchers found that people with certain disorders related to low blood sugar had higher killing rates than the average person. An imbalance in one molecule can have a strong effect of our actions and thoughts (DeWall et Al., 2010). Another study found a link between medical conditions like diabetes and mental illness. One could reasonably assume there could be a link between a new diagnosis and depression, but the article goes even further by stating that a patient who has depression tends to have worse outcomes from their chronic disorder. In addition, the researchers found that people with depression are at a higher risk of developing another medical condition, further exacerbating the imbalance (Chronic Illness & Mental Health, n.d.).

            With all this imbalance and negative effects, one might want to know the cure. For type 2 diabetes, usually the cure is combating the reasons for obesity, diet and exercise; however, the cure for type 1 diabetes remains elusive. There is hope, however. The 2013 paper on possible cures concludes that stem cell therapy seems like a promising treatment, especially if it was used in connection with other conventional treatments (Chhabra and Brayman, 2013). Another, yet less conventional, source of hope might be Ayurvedic medicine. A 2015 article describes Ayurveda as a holistic approach to personalized medicine which has been around for thousands of years. Some who practice this type of medicine claim that Ayurveda has the ability to cure diseases, like cancer or diabetes, that modern medicine cannot. The authors point out that it is very hard to validate these claims due to limited scientific research and discuss the need for more strong scientific studies on the topic (Semwal et al., 2015). No matter what the cure might be, it is my hope that the lives of those hundreds of millions with diabetes might be brought back into balance.

References

Chhabra, P., & Brayman, K. L. (2013). Stem Cell Therapy to Cure Type 1 Diabetes: From Hype to Hope. STEM CELLS Translational Medicine, 2(5), 328-336. doi:10.5966/sctm.2012-0116

Chronic Illness & Mental Health. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/publications/chronic-illness-mental-health/index.shtml

Dewall, C. N., Deckman, T., Gailliot, M. T., & Bushman, B. J. (2010). Sweetened blood cools hot tempers: Physiological self-control and aggression. Aggressive Behavior, 37(1), 73-80. doi:10.1002/ab.20366

Economic Costs of Diabetes in the U.S. in 2012. (2013). Diabetes Care, 36(4), 1033-1046. doi:10.2337/dc12-2625

Obesity and overweight. (2020, April 01). Retrieved from https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/obesity-and-overweight#:~:text=In 2016, more than 1.9 billion adults aged 18 years,650 million adults were obese.&text=Overall, about 13% of the,tripled between 1975 and 2016.

Prasad, R. (2019, March 14). The human cost of insulin in America. Retrieved from https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-47491964#:~:text=Diabetics in the US pay,all in some European countries.

Semwal, D., Chauhan, A., Mishra, S., & Semwal, R. (2015). Ayurvedic research and methodology: Present status and future strategies. AYU (An International Quarterly Journal of Research in Ayurveda), 36(4), 364. doi:10.4103/0974-8520.190699