Rounding up 2008

End of year round-ups can be fun. We get the top 10 this or that, often with pictures, and can enjoy the reminders of news stories and pop culture fads for the past year. Another round-up comes from the Diabetes Self-Management website in "2008: The Year in Diabetes." The post covers news stories, blog entries, web stories, and even recipes of note from 2008.

The most interesting of the lot (to me) was a story that I had missed: "ADA's New Guidelines OK Low-Carb Diets for Weight Loss." This is an major (like tectonic plate size) shift in policy regarding diet for diabetics. For many years, the American Diabetes Association has advocated a carb-filled diet for diabetics that has to have killed off quite a few Americans and made many more totally miserable.* It doesn't sound like the ADA is ready for a full on embrace of reality and the effect that carbs have on blood glucose and what that means for diabetics, but it sure looks like a truce. Things could get interesting in 2009.

*If that sounds a little too scathing, let me note that, when first diagnosed with diabetes, I visited the ADA web site. The one question that I had at that time was: what can I eat? After reading their recommendations, I never went back to the ADA site. I don't donate to their charity. I don't pay attention to what little advocacy that they do. I just ignore them. I would dearly love to have some easy answers to my question, but, after that look at the ADA, I've been digging out the answers on my own, one vegetable at a time apparently. *sigh*