Just for a minute, imagine...

 

you live in a place where education stops at the elementary school level, where food is scarce and your next meal isn't guaranteed, where health care is a luxury and there are about as many doctors as there are department stores, where a small cut may mean a fatal infection, and where Type 1 Diabetes essentially equals a death sentence.

 

 

Type 1 Diabetics requires constant blood glucose monitoring and access to insulin.  Type 1 Diabetes in itself is an autoimmune disorder which detroys the pancreas, the organ that produces insulin.  Without insulin the glucose that enters the blood stream cannot be taken up by cells to be used as an energy source.  A build up pf glucose in the blood stream eventually becomes toxic and leads to death.

 

Without insulin, the life expectancy of a person with Type 1 Diabetes is a matter of days or weeks.  Type 1 Diabetics living in areas without access to necessary medical treatment, insulin or education of the disease either go undiagnosed or only survive for a very short time.  The many cases that go undiagnosed don't even factor into statistics, making Type 1 Diabetes seem like much less of a problem than it really is.