"Juvenile Diabetes: The Race For A Cure"

As the founder and co-chair of the Senate Diabetes Caucus, I have learned much about the disease and the difficulties and heartbreak that diabetes causes for so many American families as they await a cure. Diabetes is a life-long condition that affects people of every age, race and nationality. It is the leading cause of kidney failure, blindness in adults, and amputations not related to injury.

The burden of diabetes is particularly heavy for children and young adults with Type 1, or juvenile diabetes. Juvenile diabetes is the second most common chronic disease affecting children, and it is one that they never outgrow. On average, a child with Type 1 diabetes will have to take over 50,000 insulin shots in a lifetime.

Moreover, it is estimated that diabetes accounts for more than $132 billion of our nation’s annual health care costs, and that health spending for people with diabetes is almost double what it would be if they did not have diabetes.

These statistics are truly overwhelming. But what really has motivated me to devote so much energy to this issue are the opportunities I have to meet people whose lives have been forever changed by diabetes.

I recently had such an opportunity when I welcomed to Washington more than 150 delegates from throughout the United States and around the world to the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation’s 2007 Children’s Congress. As a co-chair of the JDRF Children’s Congress, I held a hearing of the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee to examine the federal role in the public-private partnership to accelerate the research that will lead to a cure for this terrible disease.

Some of our witnesses who testified at the hearing are famous, such as the actress Mary Tyler Moore, who has lived with diabetes for 40 years and is the international spokesperson for JDRF, and professional basketball star Adam Morrison, who was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes when he was 14 years old. Some are experts, such as Dr. Griffin Rodgers, director of the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases.

But the witnesses who best illustrated the urgency of finding a cure were the children. Among them was Caitlin Crawford, a 13-year-old from Yarmouth who was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes nearly two years ago. Caitlin is an avid skier, and manages her diabetes with the same courage and determination she brings to competition on the slopes. Unlike ski racing, however, where each race has a beginning and an end, her diabetes is always with her.

Fortunately, in the race to find a cure, we are making progress. Since I founded the Senate Diabetes Caucus in 1997, funding for diabetes research has more than tripled from $319 million to more than a billion dollars last year. As a consequence, we have seen some encouraging breakthroughs in diabetes research, and we are on the threshold of a number of important new discoveries.

For example, a new drug has been shown in clinical trials to stabilize or reverse the progression of Type 1 diabetes, demonstrating for the first time that the clinical course of the disease can be altered. Advances in technology, like continuous glucose sensors, are helping patients control their blood glucose levels, which is essential to preventing diabetes complications. These advances are also moving us closer to our longer-term goal of an artificial pancreas. And drugs originally designed for cancer therapy are showing tremendous potential for treating diabetic eye disease, the leading cause of blindness in working-age adults.
I am very pleased that there is strong support in the Congress for increased funding for diabetes research. Last month, 64 Senators joined me in sending a letter to the Senate Leadership urging increased funding for Type 1 diabetes research. We have come a long way in treatment and prevention of diabetes, but we will reach the finish line of finding a cure only by continuing to move forward.