Defined in the narrowest sense, glycobiology is the study of the structure, biosynthesis, and biology of sugar that are widely distributed in nature. Sugars or are essential components of all living things and aspects of the various roles they play in biology are researched in various medical, biochemical and biotechnological fields.
You don't know what a paradigm shift is? Well, if I mentioned events and names like: Gutenberg, Copernicus, Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein, Louis Pasteur, and Werner von Braun you would probably guess a paradigm shift is major shift in thinkingand you would be right.
Back in the 1960's, Thomas Kuhn wrote a famous book, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. In it, he destroyed the common misconception so many of us have about science.
We tend to think scientific progress is ushered in by a slow, line upon line, piece by piece development of thought over time.
Thomas Kuhn showed that, historically, scientific progress occurs in leaps and is always confronted by a struggle with an "old guard." The old scientific theorists hold tenaciously to their (usually tenured or profitable) positions and array themselves against the new discovery, attempting to drive it away.
But, the new guard - the new discoverers, inventors, explorers- takes the new discoveries and advances it over the thinking of the old establishment. Rarely is the old guard converted to the new patterns of thinking (new discovery). They just die off. The new position wins by attrition truthand perseverance.
Diabetes: The $232 billion dollar pandemic
Diabetes is on the front edge of such a paradigm shift.
Diabetes now afflicts over 30 million Americans. That is triple plus the number of people with diabetes just since 1991 alone.
According to the CDC, one in every three Americans will develop diabetes in their lifetime. Let that sink in; one in every three Americans will develop diabetes in their lifetime.
It is estimated over 60 million Americans can be classified as "pre-diabetes" meaning they have blood sugar levels higher than normal but still below the type 2 diagnosis level which helps to define diabetes.
By anyone's standard that is pandemic (goes far beyond epidemic proportions). The cost for this carnage is over $232 BILLION DOLLARS. So much expense, grief and sorrow and unnecessary.
Diabetes: A reflection of our culture.
We are a fast food, sedentary, "get-our-fix-now" generation. More than one in every two Americans are overweight. We don't exercise as we should. All of which affects glucose levels. Diabetes is a lifestyle disease and we've got the lifestyle.
Diabetes: The important announcement
That said, diabetes is a condition which CAN be turned around. Glyconutrition is the new discovery shaking the medical and scientific worlds. There are four Nobel Prizes and MIT testifying to the fact that glycobiology is one of the 10 technologies/discoveries which will shape our world.
Glyconutrition is more than just a promising new treatment for diabetes. Many are starting to whisper "VICTORY" over diabetes in their approach to disease.
Whether that is the case, time will tell.
Oh no The problem is not a failure of glyconutrition. It is the building block VITAL to healthy cellular function and it is extremely vital to the proper functioning of the IMMUNE system. Those are known facts.
Diabetes is an auto-immune disease meaning, your body's immune system gets misguided messages. Thus, it starts attacking the islet cells in the pancreas which produces insulin. Voila...diabetes!
But, the problem is NOT whether glyconutrition really works. Anecdotal evidence (market buzz!) is already overwhelming in favor of glyconutritional therapy for diabetes. As is the professional research.
No the actual science is NOT the problem. The problem is the old guard again. Thomas Kuhn's book is almost prophetic. The old guard, the medical and pharmaceutical establishment, just can't accept the findings of (their own) research "What! A nutrient to treat diabetes?" "Hogwash," one can almost hear them say.
Actually, I wish they were saying that out loud. The reality is, they just ignore the issue. You see, too much is at stake. Like billions of dollars $232 billion dollars. All of that money (read, "business") disappears if glyconutrition continues to "pan out" the way the research shows us. But, for now, the only thing "panning out" is a diabetes pandemic.
Yet, glyconutrition gets shunned as an official diabetes treatment approach.
A study published in the 1997 issue of the Proceedings of the Fisher Institute for Medical Research showed that people with type 1 diabetes who were given glyconutrients "reported a dramatic improvement in their health, including a decrease in vision problems, better wound healing, less infections, and lower blood pressure." (Miracle Sugars, by Rita Elkins, M.H., Woodland Publishing, p. 26)
"Glycobiology has achieved critical breakthroughs in the medical field, primarily by addressing what could be the greatest plague in health care today -- auto-immune diseases. Multiple sclerosis, arthritis, diabetes, Crohn's disease and colitis are just a few of these diseases." - Dr. Neecie Moore, Ph.D. (cf. Rita Elkins, M.H.
Miracle Sugars, Woodland Publishing, p. 18.)
Also, mannose (one glyconutrient) can stimulate the pancreas to produce more insulin "thus lowering the amount of insulin needed to control this disease." (Miracle Sugars, p. 27).
Reality Check: The lives of 1 out of every 3 Americans are affected directly by diabetes and there is a $132 billion dollar diabetes pandemic running amuck in our midst. So, I sure hope this paradigm shift - glyconutrition - gets less opposition from the "powers that be" (the "old guard"), and is given its rightful place in the sunsoon.
But, with the money being made by the pharmaceuticals and their drugs, and the astoundingly simplistic view of disease treatment ("Blast that disease with technology and drugs!") it is doubtful if Thomas Kuhn's "paradigm shift" will work out any differently for diabetes across the land.
The old guard will attack and ignore the discovery - arguably, the greatest in medical history in over a hundred years - and, a la Kuhn, they will simply go the way of the Dodo Bird and diabetes treatment will receive its due.
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