Is it me or are there like 5 new diabetes drugs or combinations created every year? And the ads are so casual about it, like everyone has it and it's fine.

I haven't developed it yet, but type 2 runs rampant in the women (and some men) of my family. So obviously the number 1 thing I'm trying to achieve with LC WOE is to try my best to avoid that fate.

When I look at them, I feel like it wasn't inevitable. Our culture has rice and beans with freaking everything and plantains and sweets etc. But I could be wrong.

Anyway, it disappoints me how this is a multi billion dollar industry and how LC will always be disparaged, lest big pharma receive little return on their investment.

I'm angry. It's like they're betting against us and counting on diabetes being the norm.

I know no matter what a fraction of the population will still develop it. But I think we are so far from that scenario. I think the problem will continue to get worse and mainstream doctors will continue advocating low fat, low red meat, and plant-based nonsense.

End of my rant, thanks for reading!

LostAgain - your rant echos my thinking as well with the ever-increasing T2D epidemic. One major silver lining is that you have an awareness few develop that will provide you the information you need to adopt a very healthy way of eating and, if you consistently apply it, likely avoid T2D and the many associated symptoms of metabolic disease. In your case, knowledge is going to save you years of misery, and your example of embracing a healthy lifestyle may inspire the people around you. Yes, there are many forces in our society today that discourage doing anything counter to the expert recommendations; however, there's a vested interest in many of these recommendations that involve pharmaceuticals and medical treatments. There is only one who has a vested interest in following a healthy lifestyle, and that's you. Listen to your inner voice, it will steer you in the right direction.

Too many drug commercials - period.

My doctor should know a lot more about what I need than some salesperson on TV or anywhere else.

If my doc doesn't keep up with new developments, it's time for a new doc.

And if you don't believe the produce people are behind the 'plant based diet' adicles (advertisement articles - I just made that up) I have a bridge to sell you.

Bob

Lost Again, many feel the same way. I feel that way at times. It's frustrating that corporate business takes presidence over the well being of the people. We are corporate slaves. The US medical establishment is hand in glove with the pharmaceutical industry....Only a few see the light......a growing few. So many more and more doctors are banning together to support low carb, whole food diets to decrease obesity and control the numerous diseases affiliated with metabolic disease.

Low carb is an open secret now and not vilified like in the past. It's relatively safe to openly talk about it. Times are changing.... There is hope.

There are two COs listed at local medical center. That is CHANGE in this itty bitty backwards town.

Rant as often as you need. Then remember change is happening faster and faster. If not fast enough for those of us who are leap years ahead already.

"adicles"

I like it. I stay away from tv and the barrage of pharma ads there. But I spend a great deal of time online, with personal communications, news, and entertainment, all of which bring a boatload of "adicles" page after page.

Last night I watched a documentary on Evolution. Peoples from all over the present world were shown: hunter/gatherers in Africa, the "runner" people in the mountains of South America, Europeans bearing genetic strains of Neanderthal. Not surprisingly, the epidemic of "diabesity" worldwide was covered.

With the breakthrough of sorting out the human genome, further advances are enabling humans to create "new" humans through genetic tinkering (in the earliest embryos) and the manufacture of human organs like ears and hearts from stem cells. In short, evolution is speeding up via human intervention.

Meanwhile, natural selection may still be operating by way of the ongoing mysteries of the human body, and, needless to say, by heedless behaviors. Next to skin, fat is the largest human organ, active in undiscovered ways. Those of us here who have been monitoring its effects all our lives understand the problem.

Good points. Given the emerging information on Epigenetics first identified in the 40s, but understood better in the 90s, we now realize that while human genes take many, many generations to mutate and change, epigenetic factors at the cellular level are able to express or continue to repress genetic characteristics and tendencies. The other realization is that epigenetic tendencies at the cellular level are passed on to subsequent generations, both good and bad influences on health and lifespan. So, knowing this, the power of lifestyle practices and environmental exposures become paramount in living a healthy life. What I like about this realization is that individuals are able to play an active and immediate role by influencing health in positive ways without being passive victims of an inherited genome. Can people avoid or resolve T2D despite it being a family characteristic? Yes, but unfortunately, those drug commercials frame it like a life sentence that could never be treated differently; meanwhile, those people in the drug commercials look so happy.

Too often diseases that can be either reversed or ameliorated by lifestyle changes are framed as if they were solid things that people have and can do little or nothing about other than treat the symptoms. The pharmaceutical industry banks on this view of disease. Fortunately many of us here know differently. The fact that something has a genetic basis does not necessarily mean that nothing can be done about it. This is much too simplistic a view of the role of genes in creating disease and the ability of people to effect the outcome.

Yes. My favorite is the one with the fit people playing tennis.

The problem with internet ads and commercials is ... they're based on an algorithm according to our search history. We do a search for diabetes, or lowcarb or keto ... or blood sugar. Abracadabra POOF! We're bombarded with ads for diabetes drugs, If you've also searched for natural cures, POOF! your ads will include diabetic supplements, unproven cures and links to videos that proclaim "your doctor is lying, here's what they don't want to tell you"

*Sigh*

This is why I love this forum so much . Our loyal members present us with real studies, or at least media reports of such.

Always go to the original science. Media reports are often just interpretations by the journalist. Not fact.

...and you're lucky if it's a competent journalist and not glorified spammers calling themselves "writers" hired by PR firms to churn out clickbait aka 'native advertising', a la the Keto Crotch campaign.

We have a Worlds Collide situation going on: healthy skepticism and the ability to make sense of a study abstract is key to "doing my own research" and yet we see people who don't know how, won't learn, and chase after all kinds of Health Easy Button. They call it "doing the research" but one fool watching another one on Youtube is not thinking or research, by any stretch of the imagination.

As I constantly tell people, I don't have to know the science. I do have to know who to trust and how to tell if they know what they are talking about. In previous generations, this kind of public information was tightly controlled and regulated. It may have been wrong, mind you, but it was consistent.

Still, I think we will always have the people who realize they need to change their lives, and others who refuse to, and chase con artists dreams.

Most of the world bans pharmaceutical ads from TV & printed magazines, so I rarely see them unless watching a US TV channel. Do they hire top auctioneers to recite the lists of side effects so they can get them all in within 30 seconds?

I found this thread on drug commercials and now that we are halfway through 2023 I can say nothing has changed. No other country allows such propaganda to flow through the airwaves because it's wrong. It shouldn't be a product advertised.

It's about normalizing taking all kinds of drugs. I know SO many who shrug fatalistically because by now, a lot of their hobbies and habits revolve around food. "I'm doing all I can," they say, calibrating their diabetes med to account for dessert.

Maybe I was simply early in "not having the luxury." They ate this way for years without problems, they think. They take a statin just so their doctor won't nag them. They don't drink soda, they drink vitamin water.

It's so hard to be quiet. One note is that there's more autoimmune ads now. When diet works. Maybe that news is getting out about diabetes, it seems that way. I'd love to see these markets collapse. There's plenty of actual disease getting neglected as they chase the latest cure for our processed food addiction.

My solution?

No TV. I turned it off in 1990 and never looked back. Disconnected the cable, took the mast that used to hold an antenna down.

I'm a musician and I gigged on cruise ships from 1986 to the end of 1989. TV wasn't available on the ships then, just a movie that played over and over and over and the advertising stations. I learned to do things instead of watching.

When I got off the ship, I hooked up the cable, and found myself not watching. I got used to doing things (I learned to play 5 other instruments). So I disconnected.

I'd rather live my life by doing things than live my life vicariously by watching actors pretending to do things.

The two last TV shows I watched were Johnny Carson's last "Tonight" show and Jay Leno's first "Tonight" show, and I had to go to my mother-in-laws to see them. Carson was part of my childhood so I wanted to say goodbye, and hello to Jay.

When I look back, I remember the things I did and the experiences I had, not the TV shows I watched.

As far as commercials are concerned? Television IS the salesman in your living room. It has always been that. If you are not paying for the show, you are not the customer, you are the product. People buy your eyes and ears for a minute or so.

So if you watch, and don't like the ad, remember, someone paid for you to see it.

Full disclaimer. My wife and I subscribe to the one-DVD-at-a-time plan at Netflix. We watch one or two movies a month. That is the only time our little TV ever goes on.

Bob