Category : Blogs

Sub Category : World

Over 100 million people use prescription medication to help them live whether it be for anxiety, depression, high blood pressure, cancer, and diabetes. Over the years the amount of type 1 diabetics in the world has skyrocketed. In 2015 30 million people were diagnosed or undiagnosed with type 1 diabetes. Type 1 diabetes is when their pancreas produces no insulin because their body attacked the cells that produce insulin. Insulin works by helping to regulate your blood sugar levels by using the sugar as energy. They get glucose through their food but because their pancreas can’t make insulin then the glucose can’t go anywhere. Since the glucose doesn’t move from the bloodstream because of the lack of insulin it raises the blood sugar. It forces them to inject insulin to balance out blood sugar levels. One major thing about type 1 diabetics is the fact that they are insulin-dependent, and because they are insulin-dependent the prices, they must spend to stay alive increase. Type 1 diabetics should get free healthcare and supplies because their supplies are expensive, their condition is life-threatening, and government-issued free medicine for one issue, they should for another.  

     
      First off, since Type 1 diabetics are insulin dependent, they have to get supplies every 1-3 months which can control part of how diabetics live because insulin cost is expensive. Some end up having to live very minimalist as a result. Without any insurance, the pricing of both equipment and insulin can be quite a bit of money. With two known ways to give yourself insulin being insulin pens or an insulin pump.  One 3ml Kiwi pen brand insulin pens can last an entire month. In Walmart, a 5 pack of those pens can cost over 300 dollars. The 10 pack of those pens cost over 600 dollars. While, a 15 pack of those pens can cost over 900 dollars. In Walgreens, that same pack of 5 pens costs over 400 dollars. The 10 pack of those pens cost over 940 dollars. While the 15 pack of those pens’ costs over 1,400 dollars. Depending on the quality and quantity the pens can be even higher in price. Then there’s the other method of getting insulin called an insulin pump. An insulin pump is an electronic device used to deliver your insulin instead of giving yourself shots with the insulin pens. The pump works by attaching a cannula into your skin which connects to your pump through an infusion set. The pump will work much like a pancreas and deliver a set amount of insulin slowly in 24 hours. The pump allows you to set the amount of insulin you need before you eat a meal. It will also monitor your blood sugar levels and alert you if it’s too high or too low, and alert you when an action needs completed. The pump is small enough to fit in your pocket or hang on your pants, shirt, or bra strap with the clip attached. The small problem is while this small pump can help many diabetics better control their diabetes, without any insurance this pump is rather expensive. My sister who is a type 1 diabetic herself has the Tandem slim insulin pump. This pump without insurance can run well over 6,000 dollars. Not to mention that while the insulin pens already have insulin in them the pumps do not. You’ll need to buy the vials of insulin for the pump. Just one vial of insulin can cost from four to five hundred dollars. As well as the numerous emergency room visits diabetics may have due to their blood sugar levels. Which the hospital visits are most times out of nowhere and I’ve seen my sister go to the hospital more times than my other 4 family members combined. Some people could argue that insulin is priced so high because it’s expensive to produce, but that’s actually bogus insulin doesn’t cost more than 5 dollars to produce. It’s only priced high because pharmaceutical companies exploit the insulin, so they can price it at whatever they want.  They get very tantalizing trying to say they’ve come up with a miraculous cure but there isn’t one.

   
     In addition, many people don’t realize the exact dangers that come to diabetics who have no insulin. The main cause of death of diabetics is Diabetic Ketoacidosis, or better known as DKA. DKA can occur when the diabetic does not get insulin, or when their blood sugar level is too high. Whenever a diabetic does not get insulin the body can’t get the glucose for energy. So, it finds another source of energy called fat. The liver will break down the fat and it will produce an energy source called Ketones. If the process of breaking down the fats into ketones occurs to often it will make the blood in your body acidic causing your PH levels to lower. Whenever this happens even normal people without diabetes could die. Since insulin and equipment is so expensive some people had to opt out of insurance because they couldn’t do it. Then those people die of DKA whenever they don’t have the money to get insulin. An ironclad piece of evidence is that is exactly what happened to Shane Patrick Boyle, Alec Raeshawn Smith, and many others. Shane Boyle’s mother had been dying so he moved to Arkansas from Texas to be with her. Shane because of this had no job at the time of his death with no access to health benefits or insurance. With only enough insulin to sustain himself during the current month. Shane made a go-fund-me page for the $750 dollars he needed for insulin and supplies. That $750 was his next month’s supply. He claimed that if he could get the next month’s supplies than he could work to finding a long-term solution. Sadly, that chance never came up for Shane. His go-fund me page stopped getting donations at 700 dollars. For the next two weeks his amount stayed at 700 dollars. Unfortunately, it didn’t get any higher than that Shane Patrick Boyle passed away just 50 dollars short of his goal. The low amount of insulin that he had on hand he had been rationing to make it last longer until he got more insulin. He died from DKA just two days after his mother Judy’s passing.
 Nicole Smith-Holt lost her son Alec Raeshawn Smith when he was only 26 years old to Diabetic Ketoacidosis. At age 26 Alec had aged off his mother’s insurance plan. Which means he now had to pay for his own insulin. Alec was told that for insulin and supplies it would cost him about 1,300 dollars a month without insurance. Having 35,000 as his yearly salary means he didn’t qualify for Medicaid. The insurance plan him and his mother had found was one for $450 dollars a month but with an annual deductible of $7,600. $7,600 which would have to be paid out of pocket before the insurance even started. Alec decided to go without insurance figuring that would be easier to pay then 7,600 dollars. Sadly, though he passed away just a few weeks after that from Diabetic Ketoacidosis. Found alone in his apartment the insulin pen he used for his shots was completely empty. It’s believed that Alec was rationing his insulin to make it last longer.
    Some diabetics themselves aren’t even diagnosed until years later when symptoms show, or they go into DKA. My sister who’s 16 now wasn’t diagnosed as a type 1 diabetic until she was almost 11. She was almost showing no symptoms and even when she did, they weren’t connected together. My sister wasn’t diagnosed until we went on a family trip and she’d been exhausted just walking two minutes, had extreme thirst, and frequently used the restroom. It concerned my parents and they tested her blood sugar at home, and it was over 500 while a normal person’s blood sugar isn’t usually over 150-160. She thankfully was okay after 3 days in the hospital but was diagnosed as type 1 diabetic.  My sister has gone into DKA herself but thankfully it was caught, and we rushed to the Emergency Room. Another very dangerous thing for diabetics is getting sick. When they get sick, they can’t control their numbers as well and ketones can occur easier. Which again is a huge factor for going into Diabetic ketoacidosis. There’s been moments where my sisters had the flu and had to be rushed to the emergency room. Which as explained earlier can be costly if you have frequent surprise visits to the ER.

   
    Generally speaking, people want to be treated the same as others, they want the same things, opportunities, and rights as anyone else. So, it would make sense for people to want the same medical opportunities that some get. In this instance, diabetics may want the same opportunities as opioid addicts. Per the recent incline in opioid overdoses, the state has tried to find a way to reduce the deaths caused by opioid overdose. The government administrated free Narcan kits in places across the world like Walgreens, ER’s, CVS, and other pharmaceutical companies. Naloxone or Narcan is made to help revive someone who’s having a suspected opioid overdose. Naloxone blocks the effects of the opioid from reaching receptors located in your brain that give off the effects from the opioid. While it isn’t going to completely take away the symptoms it can help while you take that person to the hospital for better treatment. The free kits being given out include two doses with instructions on how to use them. Naloxone is far cheaper than insulin even when it isn’t free and can cost from 40 dollars to $140 for Narcan which, is the brand name for Naloxone. In 2015 33,091 people died from an opioid overdose. While in 2015 almost 80,000 people had passed away from diabetes because they are unable to get insulin, and even more died with diabetes being the contributing cause. With both causing a staggering number of deaths.  My question is why can’t the state issue something to contribute and reduce the deaths in diabetics as well? The Narcan kits helped reduce the opioid deaths by even a little bit, and it could greatly reduce the death of people with diabetes. Furthermore, type 1 diabetics are born with their condition it may not be immediately diagnosed but it’s automatically a part of them. They don’t choose this lifestyle for themselves, and they can’t get away from it because there is no cure. I think If we were able to help a cause that was preventable and curable, we should give aid to diabetics.

  
  To conclude, Type 1 diabetics should get free healthcare and supplies because their supplies are expensive, their condition is life-threatening, and government-issued free medicine for one issue, they should for another issue as well. The death toll for diabetics was already at almost 80,000 people in 2015, and it’s been 6 years and I don’t imagine it’s gone down at all. Personally, I think it’s probably gone up tremendously since then and that’s a major problem. We have the resources and the medication that isn’t costly to produce, so lowering that amount of people should be achievable. Even if it doesn’t make a noticeable difference in the number of deaths in diabetics. It’s important that we at least try to help by at least saving a few.