1 in 3 US teens have prediabetes, new CDC data show

(abcnews.go.com)

43 points | by hilux 18 hours ago ago

18 comments

  • throwaway81523 12 hours ago ago

    I was diagnosed with prediabetes as a teen. Wasn't obese or terribly out of shape, just had too much crap in my diet. Cleaned up diet and condition went away. Everything fine since.

  • getpokedagain 15 hours ago ago

    One in three is fucking nuts

    • Ancalagon 13 hours ago ago

      absolutely wild, considering it used to be such a rare disease

      • 8fingerlouie 10 hours ago ago

        Admitted, i'm an old fart, but when i was a kid, cake was something we had on sundays, sodas was something we got at a birthday party, and we had one, maybe two, and meals were rich in protein and fat, with carbohydrates usually being at the bottom. We spent the entire day outside, riding our bikes, playing (as in physical, not computer), riding skateboards, etc.

        These days it almost feels like sugar has replaced a lot of the protein and at least some of the fat, and we eat a lot more of it.

        Sodas are no longer a "monthly" event, but a daily event, and people will happily drink 2-3-4 sodas per day (or more). In our food, a lot of the protein has been replaced by sugar and fat as well.

        And instead of running around, playing on the streets, kids these days sit in front of a computer/tablet/phone/tv/whatever.

        • mixmastamyk 2 hours ago ago

          Soda has been on the downswing for… twenty years? As folks learned more about it. Maybe some didn’t get the memo.

          The documentary “sugar coated” goes into the reasons. Surprise, the sugar industry was involved.

      • a5c11 9 hours ago ago

        Thank food corporations for pouring high-fructose corn syrup into everything.

        • giingyui 9 hours ago ago

          If I buy eggs, beef, and fruit do they have HFCS in them?

  • wnc3141 14 hours ago ago

    MAHA is weird because it correctly identifies that the shareholder driven food industry has completely warped health outcomes related to our diet. Then they completely miss the mark with their bizzaro and unfounded theories on the causes and how to move forward.

    • Spivak 2 hours ago ago

      When you are, apparently, physically incapable of seeing the fundamental incentive structure surrounding the production and sale of foodstuffs, with the fact that consumers are for the most part takers of goods as the underlying problem, your brain starts to pattern-match on weirder stuff.

  • mensetmanusman 16 hours ago ago

    Sugar overdose for the win!

    • hedora 15 hours ago ago

      There’s no way sugar is the root cause, since this wasn’t a problem back when it was the default sweetener.

      HFCS and “ultra processed foods” (food with all the fiber removed) are much more likely.

      I’ve also noticed school lunches often jam artificial sweeteners into stuff that should not be sweet. They’re known to cause excessive hunger, and at the very least train kids that everything needs to be sweet.

      • Newlaptop 5 hours ago ago

        HFCS is a sugar. The difference between HFCS and standard cane sugar is relatively minor - a 5% difference in the ratio of fructose to glucose.

        There's some evidence HFCS is worse than sucrose (standard refined cane sugar) and some metabolic mechanisms to make that plausible, but it's a relatively minor difference compared to just the overall amount of consumption.

        10 grams of "sugar" (sucrose) is 5 grams of fructose. 10 grams of high fructose corn syrup is 5.5 grams of fructose.

        A diet going from 10 grams of any sugar per day to 50 or 100 grams of any sugar per day is going to have a drastically larger impact on health than if the 10 grams were sucrose vs HFCS.

      • 8fingerlouie 10 hours ago ago

        It's probably a combination.

        30-40 years ago, sugar wasn't in everything, or at least not in the levels it is found today. People also chuck down liquid sugar like there's no tomorrow, which is also something "new" that wasn't around 30-40 years ago.

        People today are less active, eat much more calories, many in the form of sugar, and many in the form of fat.

        The main problem is, even if you wanted to go back to a "1970s diet", you probably couldn't today. Processed food is everywhere.

      • Spivak 14 hours ago ago

        I'm not sure school lunches could reasonably be the culprit because we're talking a third and there's simply too much variation across thousands of school districts. Whatever it is has to affect everyone across the US mostly the same.

      • hulitu 13 hours ago ago

        > There’s no way sugar is the root cause, since this wasn’t a problem back when it was the default sweetener.

        You may want to check the quantities.

        Also, back in the day, not every product contained sugar or glucose syrup.

  • dartharva 14 hours ago ago

    Quite convenient timing for this news to arrive just as GLP-1 drugs are about to explode...

    • general1726 5 hours ago ago

      I don't see a problem, you can have diabetes while being thin.

      • gizmo686 5 hours ago ago

        GLP1 drugs were developed to manage blood sugar levels in diabetics. Weight loss was a side effect.

        One of the issues that came up when they started getting popular for weight loss was shortages causing issues for diabetics that had been relying on them.