Diabetics have enough to deal with. It’s time to stop the bullying and hectoring

I have type 1 diabetes, an autoimmune disorder which has nothing to do with diet. The way the condition is being reported can lead to troubling consequences

“Crisis”. “Epidemic”. “NHS Threatened”. Spotted the link yet? No it’s not Covid, this time. If your next guess was diabetes, give yourself a gold star.

And if, like me, you live with it, then solidarity. It can be a straight up swine. Challenging enough, before you get to the barrage of mostly negative coverage it attracts.

Anyone freshly diagnosed with one of the numerous forms of the condition could be forgiven for thinking they’ve contracted the new leprosy. Might as well resurrect one of the names given to it in the 17th century: The p***ing evil. I do sometimes wonder how far have we have really come since the age of burning witches.

Some combination of the words I mentioned at the start are what you will see almost every time diabetes is mentioned. And it is getting mentioned a lot – in no small part because, as a recent report by Diabetes UK made clear, the numbers are booming: to an estimated 5m.

All because of bad diet? Yeah! You brought it on yourselves, witches! (Except, fun fact: sometimes it doesn’t have anything at all to do with diet.)

Take those of us with what is now called “type 1 diabetes”, previously poorly categorised as “juvenile diabetes” (spoiler: you don’t have to be a “juvenile” to get it). I personally prefer to refer to “type 1 autoimmune diabetes” for the ignoramuses who start banging on about bad diets when it gets mentioned in my hearing.

What often gets lost in the reporting of 800-calorie soup and shake regimes is that I could cut my calories to half that and it wouldn’t cure my T1, which I contracted at the age of two before I’d even heard of the sugar or carbohydrates I can’t metabolise without insulin injections.

Eating sensibly is an important part of managing diabetes, yes. Maintaining a healthy weight is a smart move, too. I’ve recently shed some serious pounds,as my own personal way of flipping the bird to a nurse who was astonishingly aggressive and unpleasant at a (rare) recent check up.

But dieting won’t “cure ” type 1 diabetes – or put it into “remission”. There are no stories like that of former deputy Labour leader Tom Watson, who slimmed down and kicked his type two diabetes into touch, to inspire T1s. If you are unlucky enough to get diagnosed with T1 diabetes due to a poorly understood combination of your genes, the environment – or maybe even a virus you encountered – welcome to life as a human pin cushion.

But the way the conversation has been conducted isn’t exactly fair to T2s, either. It feels like the old bait and switch: the government is failing to fix the NHS? Quick: find some patients to pin it on and blame.

Far from persauding people to try a treatment, the sort of hectoring, judgemental treatment I have personally encountered – even from medical professionals – doesn’t help. Humiliation can easily lead to a loss of self-esteem, even depression. Or rebellion – and bad health outcomes. It’s hard enough to secure the check ups you’re supposed to receive to keep healthy as it is.

Some of us diabetics are ostracised from an early age – are even bullied at school. I’ve spoken to plenty of people with the condition who’ve encountered “the sugar police”, judging them because they indulge in the occasional chunk of chocolate.

So, let’s consider what might work to bring those diabetes numbers down, as Diabetes UK advocates. Research is a good idea. Education, too. Public health campaigns –perhaps with the help of a smart ad agency who don’t turn people off because they feel patronised or faced with goals that are hard to achieve.

Another idea might be to address the availability and price of healthy food, which is currently ruinously expensive. We should know by now that some people have a bad diet simply because they just can’t afford a good one. I was told by an education professional that some kids go to school dosed up on sugary, processed food because they’re just not getting enough to eat – and a sugar rush is one way for struggling parents to ease the early morning hunger pangs.

Persecuting diabetics isn’t going to help with that, nor any of the NHS’s other problems. But making an effort to fix those problems would help everyone with diabetes, whatever the form.