The current system, rests on a precarious and complex (or should I say, chaotic?) relationship between public and private healthcare providers and the insurance industry. Sadly, reform may not be possible until Americans get much, much angrier about how badly they are being let down by the system that's supposed to serve them. A great place to start your reading is the editorial in today's New York Times. Titled "World's Best Medical Care?," it neatly summarizes not just how the US needs to do better, but also describes how badly the US is doing in relation to the rest of the developed world. The key issues: forty-five million uninsured, many more underinsured, and quality of care that varies wildly depending on the size of the patient's wallet.

What about diabetes? Surprise! The news is not good. According to the Times editorial, the US came in last in an eight-country comparison of lives lost to a number of major diseases, one of which being diabetes.

Ever wonder what would happen to a non-diabetic's blood sugar if they loaded up on a pile of concentrated sugar, preservatives and weird science fats? Doctors and the ADA call it prediabetes. This clip takes it to the extreme by sandwiching the center of 16 double stuff Oreos! Sometimes you have to be insanely blunt to make your point.

This is a brilliant example of the diabetes epidemic in action. In today's world -- many people are eating for convenience without realizing the consequences. More convenient equates to less nutritious - more preservatives, more sugar and even more fattening (the wrong fats, too!) The combination increases the amount of time our digestive enzymes need to work on these lab-derived ingredients. This sustains an elevated blood sugar following the time of consumption. Add the ADA definition of pre-diabetes (a blood sugar between 140 to 199 mg/dl 2 hours after a meal) and there you have it -- a potential player on Team Diabetes!

Think what would happen if this guy was in his doctor's office 2 hours after this stunt. I'd like to thank his employer for keeping him busy (whatever he's paid to do) well after the lunch hour - and protecting him from becoming another statistic. Big ups to HR for hiring this guy!! If he's not in marketing already -- you might consider a transfer and give this guy a raise. He's my Oreo hero.

Eli Lilly has an award they give to people who have been diabetic for 25, 50 and 75 years. They call it the Lilly for Life Award. The award recognizes people who have been enslaved to the exorbitant expenses of diabetes management, in addition to the other schedules of daily life. Endearing isn't it? The award is a significant token of Lilly's appreciation for all you have endured and sacrificed.

Lilly awards people who have used insulin for 25 years with the monetary equivalent of what your diabetes management has cost. All your copays for each bottle of insulin, each box of syringes, each blood sugar testing strip, and your ability to adapt to the ever-changing technology of diabetes care (I swear, it says that in block letters) - Lilly awards you $42,500!! I told you I lived in the land of milk and honey. ACTUALLY - it's a medal and a consent form to have your face exploited in Big Pharma marketing. You should've bought the stock! The shareholders of LLY paid approximately $1.75 per share 25 years ago, when you were diagnosed. Today that share is worth approximately $56. Anybody know the math on that return? It's probably around 3,000%.

Let's go back to that statement ever-changing technology of diabetes care. Why must it be ever-changing? Doesn't that sound a lot like never-ending? We need not spend too much time on identifying how to treat this disease when we've got that down. What we need to do is spend more time and energy on preventing the disease from happening in the first place. That is what I consider achievement. Achieve that, Lilly! And by the way - I'll take 3,000% of my $42,500 while you're at it. Thanks.

Say what you will about Michael Moore, there's little debate that the guy knows how to make a documentary. Being a filmmaker myself (though I have only worked with narrative projects, not documentaries), I can only imagine the amount of pre-production effort he must go through to eventually pull-off his theater of involuntary candor. Talk around his soon-to-be-released new documentary Sicko, which focuses on the ills of the health care system in the U.S., has already turned, well, Michael Moore-ish; to the point where threats from the U.S. Government have been made for violations of the trade embargo with Cuba.

Um....What? My response was just that after taking a cursory look at an article on Yahoo. But, upon further examination, I found that Moore flew 10 workers, all of whom had worked in the post-9/11 cleanup effort, to Cuba to receive medical treatment. Evidently, the point of doing so was to demonstrate the benefits of a socialized health care system, and how these workers have been neglected by HMO systems here in the U.S. The new documentary, Sicko, was born out of Moore's earlier presentation of a mock funeral he staged in front of a health maintenance organization for his TV show "Awful Truth." In this mock funeral, he took the HMO to task for declining to perform a pancreas transplantation for a man with diabetes.

Moore has been assailed by critics from both sides of the political spectrum, mostly for his alleged penchant for distorting facts in favor of entertainment and shock value. Whether or not this will be the case with Sicko remains to be seen. Be that all is it may, though, I am a firm believer that where there is smoke there is fire,; and in the case of the health care system, there's a blazing inferno -- something that Michael Moore couldn't have possibly started or exacerbated by himself, despite what his critics might claim.