USA TODAY ran a feature story that covered an American Diabetes Association, ADA, briefing over the weekend in which Robert Rizza, president of the ADA, stated that 7.2 million diabetic disabilities and deaths could be avoided by a simple daily pill that combined low-dose aspirin with drugs that lower cholesterol, blood pressure and blood sugar. A polypill is what Rizza called it. Rizza went on to say that this treatment would cost approximately $100 dollars a year per person. According to the ADA, 21 million Americans have diabetes with an additional 41 million Americans at risk of developing diabetes. When I read this, it struck me that this is either a groundbreaking statement that has profoundly promising implications in the future treatment for diabetes -- or this is common knowledge in the diabetes community and then -- why is no one acting on this knowledge and developing the pill Rizza is referring to? Then again, is creating a mega-pill combining so many different medications in one pill -- prudent?
I am going with groundbreaking news, as the information shared in this weekend briefing was based on a mathematical model produced by Archimedes that predicts various outcomes based on variables in treatments. Now that they have this information, what will they do with it?










