Dietary Zinc For Diabetes Prevention Not Backed By Evidence
Despite laboratory evidence that zinc helps promote the production and action of insulin and widespread marketing of zinc supplements for this purpose no randomized clinical trials show that zinc supplementation prevents the onset of type 2 diabetes.
However, this doesn’t necessarily mean that zinc doesn’t have a role in diabetes prevention. Rather, eligible studies are lacking, according to authors of a new systematic review of clinical studies, led by Vania Beletate of the Federal University of Sao Paola in Brazil.
The review appears in the current issue of The Cochrane Library, a publication of The Cochrane Collaboration, an international organization that evaluates medical research. Systematic reviews draw evidence-based conclusions about medical practice after considering both the content and quality of existing medical trials on a topic. Source
Kmart Raises over $900,000 in Support of the American Diabetes Association
Congratulations to Kmart in raising over $900,000 as a first year National Sponsor of America’s Walk for Diabetes.
In 2006, Kmart signed a three-year agreement with the American Diabetes Association to support its largest signature fundraising event, America?s Walk for Diabetes. As part of the relationship, Kmart sold “Be a Star for Diabetes” pin-ups at all of their 1,400 locations across the United States.
During a three-month time period (September - November 2006), Kmart raised over $900,000 to support the Association’s mission: “to prevent and cure diabetes and to improve the lives of all people affected by diabetes.” The American Diabetes Association would like to thank Kmart and all of their associates for their support in creating greater awareness about the diabetes cause, the work of the Association and of course their efforts in hitting this fundraising milestone. Source
New Fat Replacement for Trans Fat Raises Blood Sugar
January 2007, Waltham, MA - Last month, New York City outlawed the use of partially hydrogenated oils, known as trans fats, in restaurants, a ban now under consideration in other cities, including Boston and Chicago. But novel research conducted in Malaysia and at Brandeis University shows that a new method of modifying fat in commercial products to replace unhealthy trans fats raises blood glucose and depresses insulin in humans, common precursors to diabetes. Furthermore, like trans fat, it still adversely depressed the beneficial HDL-cholesterol.
Published online in Nutrition and Metabolism, the study demonstrates that an interesterified fat–(a modified fat that includes hydrogenation followed by rearrangements of fats molecules by the process called interesterification) enriched with saturated stearic acid–adversely affected human metabolism of lipoproteins and glucose, compared to an unmodified, natural saturated fat. Interesterification to generate a stearic acid-rich fat is fast becoming the method of choice to modify fats in foods that require a longer shelf life because this process hardens fat similar to oils containing trans-fatty acids. The new study shows that interesterification, which unnaturally rearranges the position of individual fatty acids on the fat molecule, can alter metabolism in humans.
“One of the most interesting aspects of these findings is the implication that our time-honored focus on fat saturation may tell only part of the story,” explained biologist and nutritionist K.C. Hayes, who collaborated on the research with Dr. Kalyana Sundram, nutrition director for palm oil research at the Malaysian Palm Oil Board in Kuala Lampur. Source
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Resources:
dLife; About Diabetes.com; American Diabetes Association
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Diabetes; Health News
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