Diabesity: The Obesity-Diabetes Epidemic That Threatens America-And What We Must Do to Stop It

Read an Excerpt

Chapter 1: A Tale of Two Children
Many people today think of diabetes as a slow-moving chronic disease. But it can be swift and merciless, particularly when it attacks young children. An abnormally high blood sugar level, the hallmark of diabetes, is always a medical emergency.

Experts now predict that more than one-third of American children born in 2000 will develop diabetes in their lifetime. Written by one of the world's leading authorities on the link between obesity and diabetes, this passionate, frightening-but ultimately hopeful-book points the way to a solution.

To enter Dr. Francine Kaufman's clinic is to see the future of America: a 220-pound twelve-year-old boy... a 267-pound thirteen-year-old girl... their concerned but equally overweight parents... the human faces and human suffering behind the epidemic of type 2 diabetes that threatens to overwhelm our health care system. Once a disease of the elderly, type 2 diabetes now strikes adults in their prime-and, increasingly, children. It has nearly doubled in the last decade. The cause? Our soaring rates of obesity.

Diabesity takes us to the front lines of the fight against this preventable but deadly disease. Through vivid patient stories, it explains how excess weight destroys the body's ability to process sugar properly-with life-threatening consequences. It shows what happens when the genes that evolved to protect us from famine collide with a sedentary lifestyle that has put bacon cheeseburgers on every corner. And it demonstrates why our usual blame-the-victim response is futile in face of the complex, worldwide forces behind this epidemic.

Detailing the tools for change at every level-from families to school systems to government-and reporting on innovative programs that are already making a difference, Diabesity offers a compelling action plan for winning this battle.

Francine R. Kaufman, M.D. is an internationally-known authority on diabetes and obesity. The past-president of the American Diabetes Association, she is Head, Center for Diabetes, Endocrinology and Metabolism at Childrens Hospital Los Angeles, and Professor of Pediatrics at the Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California. The author of more than 150 medical articles, she has developed many important clinical innovations.

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