On Wed, 06 Aug 2003 22:15:05 GMT, "S. Sampson" wrote:

"Walter Luffman" wrote

I'll speak to this as someone who was "pushed out the gate for being
too fat"; turned out I was developing Type 2 diabetes, but that's
beside the point.

No it's not! Type-2 is due to obesity in almost all cases.

Incorrect. VERY incorrect. Type 2 diabetes is often linked to
obesity, but that is not the same as saying that one causes the other.
Current thinking (at least among the doctors and Certified Diabetes
Instructors I know) is that something -- probably a genetic factor --
is the most common cause for both Type 2 and obesity.

FWIW, I have an uncle (my mother's sister's husband, no blood
relation) who was diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes just this past week.
He's 70 years old, tall and lean, a lifelong athlete who still plays
golf at least three days a week (yes, he uses a cart -- the
two-wheeled kind you pull). But Type 2 diabetes is common in his
family, he halfway expected to develop diabetes sooner or later.

OTOH, my maternal grandmother's family included a number of diabetics
(apparently both Type 1 and Type 2, although not known as such then)
as blood relatives. My maternal grandfather's close kin included a
few Type 2 diabetics. Both of them were obese most of their adult
lives. He died at age 83 of acute lymphocytic leukemia. She lived to
be nearly 91; she died of chronic leukemia. Neither ever had any
symptoms of diabetes, nor did the many blood tests they received ever
show elevated blood glucose. (They were tested routinely when blood
was drawn for tracking the leukemia's progress, at least until near
the very end.)

I'm not suggesting that obesity causes leukemia, of course. I'm just
pointing out that skinny people sometimes develop Type 2 diabetes and
obese people sometimes escape it. In many cases it's strictly a
matter of genetic predisposition and time.

___
Walter Luffman Medina, TN USA
Amateur curmudgeon, equal-opportunity annoyer