Half of All Americans Are Diabetic or Pre-Diabetic

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


A new study finds that half of all Americans are either diabetic or pre-diabetic. But there’s supposedly good news lurking there:

After two decades of linear growth, the prevalence of diabetes in the United States has finally started to plateau.

….Herman and Rothberg, who were not involved in the research, said the study suggests the implementation of food, nutrition and physical activity policies and regulations by federal, state and local governments as well as other efforts to curb obesity and diabetes have finally started to pay off.

Color me skeptical. Consider a thought experiment. Suppose we had done nothing about this. No government regulations. No haranguing by doctors. No PR campaigns. Nothing. What would the results be?

At a guess, half the population is naturally prone to eating (more or less) properly and isn’t especially susceptible to diabetes. So if we did nothing at all, I’d wager that about half the population would remain free of diabetes.

This is just a guess, and I doubt there’s any way to prove it one way or another. But it hardly seems like an unreasonable guess. And what it means is that all the regulating and haranguing and advertising has probably accomplished nothing. Maybe it’s time to try something else?

Fact:

Mother Jones was founded as a nonprofit in 1976 because we knew corporations and billionaires wouldn't fund the type of hard-hitting journalism we set out to do.

Today, reader support makes up about two-thirds of our budget, allows us to dig deep on stories that matter, and lets us keep our reporting free for everyone. If you value what you get from Mother Jones, please join us with a tax-deductible donation today so we can keep on doing the type of journalism 2022 demands.

payment methods

Fact:

Today, reader support makes up about two-thirds of our budget, allows us to dig deep on stories that matter, and lets us keep our reporting free for everyone. If you value what you get from Mother Jones, please join us with a tax-deductible donation today so we can keep on doing the type of journalism 2022 demands.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate