Name: Why Coronavirus Is Dangerous For Diabetics
Uploaded: 2021-06-02T07:39:17.000Z
Duration: 10 min 11 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

There's a lot of information out right now about the coronavirus.

It's safe to say almost everyone in the world is worried about either

It can be terrifying for an average healthy person.

And the people who get into trouble, namely who need to be hospitalized,

some of whom need intensive care, are very heavily weighted towards

elderly people and those with underlying conditions like chronic heart

disease, chronic lung disease, kidney disease, diabetes.

But why is diabetes on that list when coronavirus is described as a

The WHO and the CDC putting out a blanket statement that people have

And I don't know that it fully paints the real picture of what's happening

here. Actor Tom Hanks, who has Type 2 diabetes, was diagnosed with the

virus, bringing even more attention and concern for those living with

I've been sheltering in place, but I'm still anxious as to why I'm at

So we wanted to explore why is coronavirus more dangerous for diabetics?

There are different types and many ways to treat it.

In 2019, 463 million adults were living with the disease globally.

When someone has diabetes, their body's ability to produce insulin is

Type 1 diabetics make no insulin at all and need to inject it.

Type 1 makes up 10 percent of those who are living with diabetes globally.

This could mean the body doesn't use insulin properly or make enough.

It has many forms of treatment that could include medication, diet,

exercise, and many need to start insulin injections.

Either form come with high blood sugar and high blood sugar can make people

And this is a big concern with people with diabetes is that people with

higher blood sugar levels could be more susceptible to coronavirus.

Managing diabetes isn't as simple as taking insulin.

That's probably one of the few topics that make the coronavirus different

Is that we have to deal with the blood sugars.

Many things influence how blood sugar rises and falls.

Some are obvious, like the amount of carbs digested and correctly dosing

Just sitting out in the sun too long can have dramatic effects.

Keeping blood sugars in range reduces the high-risk of contracting

coronavirus, but the chance of getting sick is still as likely as the

average person. We spoke to a type 1 diabetic who was recently diagnosed

I started feeling symptoms like like slight symptoms Sunday night.

I had been at my girlfriend's Sunday and Monday.

And she took me to the doctors where they gave me an antibiotic and

antiviral. The next night, my fever had gone up to 103.

And by the Wednesday morning at 5 or 6, I was 93 and sweating.

But because the type 1, I think that's why they admitted me to the ICU and

tested me. Patrick is a 30-year-old type 1 diabetic with well-controlled

blood sugars. We spoke to him five days after testing positive for the

coronavirus. Luckily, he is now recovered, but because of his diabetes, he

was put in the intensive care unit for two nights.

Yesterday was the first day I woke up without a headache and everything.

I feel good. The American Diabetes Association states people with diabetes

are not more likely to get covid-19 than the general population.

The problem people with diabetes face is primarily a problem of worse

outcomes, not greater chance of contracting the virus.

One of the things, particularly very high blood sugar levels suppress your

immune system and and make people more susceptible to infection.

And we see this obviously, for example, with wound healing, with diabetes

that has gone on for a long time or has high levels of blood sugar.

So this is a concern when when you have a novel infection like corona,

people with diabetes are obviously concerned.

Illness is a very common reason for elevated blood sugars.

If you're sick with the flu or the coronavirus, the lack of appetite,

sleep and just the stress of sickness make it harder to manage your

diabetes. If you have chronically elevated blood sugar levels, let's say

You know, I'm talking about months and months and months.

Then your immune system just doesn't work that well.

The antibodies that usually attack foreign bodies just don't work as well.

And so those folks are more susceptible, but the actual immune system is

exactly the same. Type 2 diabetes, there's this kind of chronic

pro-inflammatory situation that underlies the type 2 diabetes and this kind

of chronic low grade pro-inflammatory state, the patients for type 2

diabetes have ultimately a response to an infection may be somewhat

And that modification is unfavorable, typically with an inadequate immune

response to say agents like the covid-19 virus.

The coronavirus could also affect the $24 billion insulin market.

Before the pandemic sent shockwaves through the economy, millions of

diabetics were facing a crisis, the price and the availability of insulin.

The number one concern I hear in the diabetes community, it's actually even

beyond an infection is access to insulin.

Subtitles ListPlay Video

Why Coronavirus Is Dangerous For Diabetics

chronic

assume

susceptible

immune