When I was growing up, I remember
Doris Day singing “Que será, será.” I was 15 years old (in 1956), and I thought
of it as an optimistic song that held the promise of a future of boundless
opportunity and possibilities. Remember the lyrics?
When I was just a little girl
|
When I grew up and fell in love
|
Now I have Children of my own
|
I asked my mother
|
I asked my sweetheart
|
They ask their mother
|
What will I be
|
What lies ahead
|
What will I be
|
Will I be pretty
|
Will we have rainbows
|
Will I be handsome
|
Will I be rich
|
Day after day
|
Will I be rich
|
Here's what she said to me
|
Here's what my sweetheart said
|
I tell them tenderly
|
|
|
|
Que sera, sera
|
Que sera, sera
|
Que sera, sera
|
Whatever will be, will be
|
Whatever will be, will be
|
Whatever will be, will be
|
The future's not ours to see
|
The future's not ours to see
|
The future's not ours to see
|
Que sera, sera
|
Que sera, sera
|
Que sera, sera
|
What will be, will be
|
What will be, will be
|
What will be, will be
|
|
|
Que Sera, Sera
|
At the time it never occurred to me
that the actual message of the song, contained in the response, was
“fatalistic,” which it clearly was. It just never occurred to me. I think
that’s because I grew up in a privileged environment. I believed the answer to the question was, in large
part, up to me. As I grew older, I often thought about how chance played a role
in my destiny, but I still considered that I had free will and that I chose the
path in life that I travelled and the things that came of it.
The title of this blog post
challenges that premise. It is a simple declaration, from researchers at the
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), that “approximately 40% of American
adults will develop diabetes in their lifetime.” And that, “In Hispanic men and
women, and non-Hispanic black women, the projected increased risk is even
higher, over 50%...” These findings came to my attention through a Diabetes-in-Control
news item reporting on a
paper in The Lancet.
The
Lancet’s hypothesis was that since diabetes incidence has increased
and mortality (in the total population) has decreased greatly in the USA, there
would therefore be “substantial changes in the lifetime risk of diabetes.” So
besides estimated “remaining lifetime diabetes risk,” the study also looked at
“life-years lost due to diabetes” and “years spent with and without diagnosed
diabetes.” “Because of the increasing diabetes prevalence, the average number
of years lost due to diabetes for the population as a whole increased by 46% in
men and 44% in women. Years spent with diabetes increased by 156% in men and 70%
in women,” The Lancet’s statistical
analysis concluded.
The Lancet’s
INTERPRETATION of the CDC’s report and their (The Lancet’s) FINDINGS:
“Continued
increases in the incidence of diagnosed diabetes combined with declining
mortality have led to an acceleration of lifetime risk and more years spent
with diabetes, but fewer years lost to the disease for the average individual
with diabetes. These findings mean that there will be a continued need for
health services and extensive costs to manage the disease, and emphasise
the need for effective interventions to reduce incidence” (emphasis
added).
The Lancet’s and the CDC’s projections are a
dispassionate analysis of statistical trends - exactly what a study like this
is supposed to do. And the call for “the need for effective interventions to
reduce incidence” of diabetes should be a clarion message to the medical
establishment. Instead, the message that I think the medical establishment gets
is “that there will be a continued need for health services…to manage the
disease.” In other words, job security for the medical establishment in
managing (i.e., treating) the increasing numbers of diabetics and the
progressive course of the disease.
Okay, I am cynical
and maybe a bit unfair. I don’t doubt that The
Lancet is sincere about “the need for effective interventions to reduce
incidence.” Can they be blamed for a myopic view of what such interventions
might be? To confining their perspective to pharmacological treatments? New
drugs? Surgery? After all, they can report on public health policy and
nutrition research, but the government only seems willing to support research
in line with predetermined dogma of “good” public health policy and nutrition.
What hope is there that the outcome will be other than, “Whatever will be, will
be.” Que será, será.
sorry actually what is The Lancet’s ?
ReplyDeleteJozan
Jozan,
DeleteThe Lancet is a peer-reviewed medical journal, one of the oldest and most prestigious in the world. It is published in Great Britain. Open the link at the end of the 3rd paragraph to see the referenced story.