Jan. 28th 09: Diabetes type 2 - Not a matter of lifestyle after all?

Jan. 28th 09: Diabetes type 2 – Not a matter of lifestyle after all?
(Article in Norwegian)

The patient’s lifestyle has until recently been given most of the blame when it comes to naming the cause of the rising epidemic of Diabetes type 2 in the western world. Now, Norwegian scientists, indicate that the patient is partly innocent.

The Norwegian newspaper ”Aftenposten” (”Daily News”) reports the 26th of January about Dr. Per Medbøe Thorsby, and his colleagues, newest findings in their research regarding the cause of development of Diabetes 2, and why some people develop the disease, while others don’t.

”Type 2-diabetes has until now been regarded as a lifestyle disease where the patients affected have been stigmatized as lazy, living on a ”bad diet”, with minimal exercise and little consciousness regarding their own health” says Dr. Thorsby. According to his findings, genetic disposition is just as an important cause as lifestyle. This is the first time this is indicated in a Norwegian study.

So does this mean that the patients are innocent?

–Yes, I would say so. They have inherited a less effective production of insulin, says Dr. Thorsby.

Their paper will soon be published in the Scandinavian Journal of Clinical and Laboratory Investigation. The breakthrough in this kind of science regarding diabetes came in an Icelandic paper presented in 2007, showing that some particular genes seemed to have great influence for the development of Diabetes type 2.

The Norwegian study supports the findings from Iceland. Around half of the Norwegian population have these particular genes, and are thereby in greater risk of developing the chronic disease. If these people in addition are overweight and not particularly physical active, chances are they will be diagnosed with diabetes earlier in life increases even more.

–We find that if a parent, brother or sister have type 2 Diabetes, risks increases three to four times to be affected oneself, says Thorsby.

And he adds:

We are now closer to understand the cause of type 2 diabetes; this might increase our hope of a more target effective treatment for these patients in the future.”

In my opinion Dr. Thorsby is definitely on the right track when he claims that the chronic autoimmune disease Type 2 Diabetes is more than just a lifestyle disease. But he still misses a giant piece of the puzzle, something of which he cannot be blamed for as he has little or no experience from microbiology to my knowledge. “They have inherited a less effective production of insulin” he says. Yes, and what more have they inherited? Only “bad genes”, or are there some other factor involved as well? Like microbiota passed from parents to children by birth?

Those of us that follow the work of the Autoimmunity Research Foundation know about the latest science regarding transmission and interaction between the human genome and those of microorganisms living inside our body, and how this can be related to chronic infections, and chronic disease. Those of you that don’t, might want to “start off easy” by having a look at the National Institute of Health*s (US) Human Microbiome Project,

and later visit the foundation’s website for more about their work.

Now, Thorsby’s science might just motivate other researchers to look closer into what is the cause of this inherited disposition. Maybe patients with this combination of genes, immune suppressive lifestyle, and a chronic intracellular infection that alters their genes during their lives, are more likely to be diagnosed with Diabetes type 2?

According to Paul W. Ewald, Director of the Center for Evolutionary Medicine at the University of Louisville (US), there are not really that many ways of developing a chronic state of disease for the human body. In this interview, conducted by Amy Proal, author and host of the website

www.bacteriality.com, he explains some of the relations between possible infections, pathogens and chronic disease.

Another article about gene transfers between humans and microorganisms from the same website can be found here.

I’d like to end this by adding that I am very pleased that Dr. Thorsby finally has managed to succeed with something, from my personal perspective. The last time I heard from him he rejected me and ended his medical investigations stating that “I was not sick, but unhealthy occupied with disease”, leaving me to try to find help somewhere else on my own. He never answered phone calls or emails while I was lying in bed in great pain and he was responsible for finding my diagnosis at that time. Who can blame him? It must be much more fun to research stuff like this, than to look after “troublesome patients” at a small local hospital. Yes, you got it right; this was when he was working at my favorite local hospital. (Read my Hospital review from Bærum Sykehus).

It’s satisfying to see that so many years of education and (mal?)practice has come to use. Congratulations Dr. Thorsby.