This Blood Test Predicts Your Future

[@SciShow]

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[@peterchan5817]

It could also show you are going to die at some point in your life

[@Plaseebo]

well written episode ty whole team

[@slothytoves]

As a type 1 it would have saved me several years of mysterious health decline if I'd had a predictive test ahead of time. It would also have saved me and my family the shock and stress when I found out. I could have been ready when it happened and minimized the drastic change in my diet and lifestyle by starting those changes early.

[@ZT1ST]

@@slothytoves On the other hand, there would have been pressure to change your diet and lifestyle. Which...don't tend to go over well. If it's a drastic change to your diet, probably over less well.

[@Eyevou]

As someone diagnosed with Type 1 after an emergency it would have been REAL helpful to know early and have been able to prepare. Knowing is half the battle, as the saying goes.

[@brightsalot]

KNOWLEDGE IS POWER

[@sentientlamp]

Feel like the psychological effect of knowing you're going to have to deal with a chronic illness eventually is way, way more manageable than the psychological trauma of experiencing a life threatening medical emergency and then suddenly having to deal with a chronic illness in the aftermath

[@20storiesunder]

Indeed. I'd prefer it for sure. Can build up some habits that would help.

[@JetzKiterr]

And realistically, why would it be any worse than when a child learns about their own mortality? "Death" is an unavoidable part of life that everyone needs to psychologically prepare for, but the sooner you can come to terms with that idea, the better you can plan for how you want to use the time you have. And this isn't even a "would you want to know exactly when/where/how you will die" type of dilemma. It's "you're going to have issues later on; here's what you need to be ready for".

[@Dubmaster3]

I'd rather not know. I can always end it if I need to.

[@maironamakesstuff]

I have diabetics on both sides of my family, types 1 and 2, so I've known since I was a kid that I might end up developing it someday. It hasn't happened yet, but when I was diagnosed with PCOS and learned that it's a metabolic condition that prevents me from absorbing insulin properly, having that knowledge about how diabetes works and is treated helped me understand how to adjust to my own treatment plan. I was even put on a "diabetes drug" for it (metformin). So yeah, it's definitely good to know what to expect ahead of time, but it doesn't have to be a huge cloud looming overhead. Forewarned is forearmed, as they say!

[@lindaseel9986]

​@@maironamakesstuffExactly! 👍👍👍

[@RobotShield]

Surely the question isn’t “will knowing this effect kids negatively?” But rather “will knowing early be less traumatic than finding out by having a near death experience?” Also the insurance company comment someone else posted is depressing but true :(

[@TheCalucita]

Ngl. I hate the take of it being this horrible thing that a toddler may have to deal with. Feels like the same approach some parents take with not telling their kid that they have adhd or autism or whatever, because they want the kid to be "normal". No. You're taking huge support systems away from the kid just because you feel "uncomfy" accepting that your kid will deal with a chronic illness. Any psychological effect the diagnosis has on a toddler is because we inflict it on them, not because of the diagnosis. We have so many tools to deal with diabetes. It is chronic. It is a pain to manage. But with a diagnosis (and a decent f- healthcare system) it is not a death sentence.

[@I1like1wood1ash]

I agree so much! If you teach the kid about their illness early and start them on the routines they'll be following when they get sick, when they develop diabetes it'll be damn near business as usual. letting them know the symptoms to look out for to let the adults know when the illness has started, so they won't develop ketoacidosis and end up in hospital. Leaving a child in the dark will mean that they'll only really learn what's up once the worst has happened, and then they'll end up struggling to learn the routines and habits needed because it'll be dumped on them all at once, they'll be getting used to all this while they're in school so they'll probably end up really stressed out, overwhelmed and fall behind. In the first case, you have a kid who's always had diabetes and is well-adjusted to it. In the second case, you'll have created a strong "before and after" diabetes with huge negative associations that will be really upsetting. If you have an option between the two, it's really obvious which one is better.

[@luiscordovadsgn]

Right?, kinda felt weird throughout the whole video

[@dragonflies6793]

THANK you! As a chronically ill person myself, that focus in the video on potential psychological impact really bothered me.

[@fredred8371]

It's harmful to tell a kid that his brain is broken

[@Nylak-Otter]

Hey, I'm so happy I was never diagnosed with ADHD/autism when I was a kid. I excelled in school and had an impressive work ethic because I wasn't treated differently than anyone else, and my parents had high expectations of me. If I had been treated as disabled, I wouldn't have been able to take so many physical risks in my personal and sports life, either.

[@seanbrodney7716]

Yeah, so I'm gonna take a completely different tack here (in addition to other arguments made here): we as a species have an ethical obligation to test as many children as possible to increase the number of children identified to be in early stages. This dramatically increases the likelihood of developing increasingly successful preventative/conservative treatments or even a cure. This could save millions of lives and decrease the burden of this disease from millions of individuals and families. This is indeed the benefit of early screening in many other diseases like cancers, which can often have much higher survival/remission rates when cause early before systemic damage ocurrs. The economic costs of screening very likely pale in comparison to the economic benefits of dealing with fewer high complication cases of diabetes long-term

[@cailinanne]

It would most certainly reduce a noticeable number of pediatric ED visits and children with some kind of damaged eyesight

[@natalieschreiber3804]

I know a family that has two young girls, one of which has diabetes and the other has tested positive for the antibodies. The first dealt with onset at 3. She was in the hospital and basically told she probably had the flu. This test allowed the family to prepare the younger sister.

[@AmonTheWitch]

it's not just you knowing your future, but insurance companies too.

[@robadkerson]

Trust that even if you don't find out yourself, that they are finding out through some heuristics. They have you data already.

[@mattdangerg]

This is the most important comment on this video. 100% true, and who knows what this test would disqualify you for or how much it might jack up your rates

[@anqied]

This wouldn't be a problem if we had universal healthcare.

[@DeltaNovum]

In what singular (richest) first world country would this be a problem?

[@MrGksarathy]

​@@DeltaNovumOnly in America...

[@darkhawk368]

Love seeing diabetes education in mainstream media. Especially on the 25 year anniversary of my diagnosis. Thank you everyone knows someone with it. But most have no idea the types are so different

[@adamkey1934]

The timing of this video is good. The test would have helped my friend. He found out last month he has type 1 diabetes. He had no symptoms apart from being thirsty a lot, but as he has a manual job in construction he thought it was just because of that. Then quite suddenly his vision became blurry. He's now got irreversible damage to his retina. He's getting treatment now, which should stop it getting worse, but it could have been prevented altogether if he'd known and kept his blood sugar stable.

[@waffles3629]

Yep. It would've helped a friend's family member as well. The kid was young enough that they didn't have the vocabulary to really explain how they felt. They were misdiagnosed by the pediatrician (apparently no one thought they needed to test a young toddler for diabetes) and only went to the hospital when they couldn't be roused after a nap. They never actually learned how high the kids blood sugar was though, because it capped out on the hospital machine that could read up to like 900. Unfortunately the damage that was caused was irreversible and they'll be dependent on their parents forever.

[@zakm0n]

Odds are your friend's vision will improve. I'm T1D diagnosed at 8, my mother at 46. Her vision went cloudy, and resolved after she started treatment.

[@denvernaicker8250]

the way he slows down his speech for the advert and then rushes through the dialog in the actual video is just perplexing to what this video wants to communicate

[@LittleTreeBlue]

I work in ophthalmology where the damage done to people’s eyes before they realize they’re diabetic (or before they take it seriously) can result in permanent blindness or (if they’re lucky) monthly intraocular injections to keep their vision at a level where they can still be independent. I saw a woman go 90% blind in a matter of 4 months even though she’d had her blood sugar under control for years (she was Type 1). The issue of what the knowledge would do to a child has everything to do with how the parents treat them and prepare them. Medically, to my mind, there is no question but that we should test children in order to catch this as soon as possible. You can’t always (or even often) undo the harm that uncontrolled diabetes causes.

[@joshuaphillips755]

Me and my best friend take turns having DKA - he just missed out on taking his daughter to a concert he already missed the year before due to an insulin pump malfunction. America needs to stop putting profits and property over people - or extremely slow motion progress is the best you'll ever get.

[@arbutusunedo2069]

It's always good to have a backup option. Pumps are slightly too unreliable as your only line of defense. I've only heard horror stories. I don't have Type I myself (heading dangerously close to Type II), but my partner (who does) has gone for a real-time sensor and rapid injection pen combination instead, and it has gone very well for them.

[@General12th]

Saving lives isn't as important as buying superyachts.

[@OwlBinary]

It's not diabetes, but I knew my mother had BRCA1 when I was 4. Every person in my family with BRCA1 died a gruesome death from cancer in their 30s or 40s, so I spent my whole life knowing I would suffer the same fate with my own BRCA1 diagnosis. It certainly caused a heavy toll on my psyche, but I am definitely grateful to have my entire life to come to terms with this. It has also made me much more appreciative of every day longer I have to live. I am but one case, tho I think many others would be grateful too to have a long time to process a lifelong affliction before it comes. If we focus on trying to help them psychologically process it at an early age I'm confident it will do more good than harm.

[@voided_sun]

When I was 12 I was diagnosed with a chronic illness and needed invasive surgery. Although realistically it just means I won't grow THAT old... As a kid, it messed me up and I thought something was wrong with me and that things would only get worse... So I basically came to terms with death as a teenager. I'm still sick and always will be, and that sucks, but I will say that it also keeps me motivated to be productive, to truly enjoy life, and to not take time for granted when you are constantly reminded of your own mortality.

[@soltersortna]

My husband was sent to the ER with pancreatitis, thankfully not full on ketoacidosis, from undiagnosed diabetes, and I can tell you (second hand) that getting slammed with a serious diagnosis after being worried for his life in the hospital and then completely changing your lifestyle and eating habits probably would have been easier if we knew earlier. He has a lot of issues with the lifestyle changes in particular, and that would be something you could just bake in at an early age if you know you're getting it. This isn't a question at all.

[@aliengeo]

I feel like adults who were never disabled kids don't really "get" that just because a doctor didn't rubber stamp it until age 15, doesn't mean the kid wasn't experiencing it at age 7. Often kids already know something is happening but don't have the words, or they've stopped talking about it because adults have stopped listening. This leads to avoidable harm. As a minor example, I've had floaters most to all of my life. But I didn't know anything about them when I was a kid, so I never mentioned it. When I learned what floaters were, I marked it on my next eye exam form and they freaked out because I'd "suddenly developed floaters." But I hadn't-nobody had ever asked me in developmentally appropriate terms. In that context, it seems vastly unethical not to both test and then provide the child with age-appropriate supports based on the result. This doesn't mean explaining everything about diabetes to a toddler, it means making sure the toddler knows what they need to tell their trusted adult about and establishing routines in advance.

[@waffles3629]

Yep. I have health problems I've had since childhood that I simply didn't know weren't normal. Some I'm only now getting diagnosed as an adult decades later. Which isn't helped by the fact many doctors discount the possibility because "if that was true you would've been diagnosed as a kid". I should've, but I wasn't. Especially not with a pediatrician who believed my parents over me 100% of the time, even at 17 and something my parents definitely wouldn't know better on (like how often I use the bathroom and how much water I drink a day). I was diagnosed with a really bad case of drama as a teenager, in my 20s I had my "drama" surgically removed. Recovery was a joke in comparison. Like to the point I was in a different doctor's office three days later and the nurses (infusion center I'm at a lot so 80% of the nurses know me) kept thinking I accidentally said days when I meant weeks. Like nope, I'm less than 72 hours out and my biggest symptoms are being super tired and grouchy because I didn't have the energy to make grilled cheese (I know this sounds like a joke, but I legit was very grumpy I didn't have the energy to make grilled cheese). And yeah, exactly, nuance. You could even start educating the kids about diabetes and what it can affect without even telling them about the test results to start with. Because then they have a framework to start with when you later tell them the information (how long that is will depend on age and level of understanding). Kids aren't stupid, they lack experience, not the ability to learn.

[@amazinggrapes3045]

They need to make it illegal to withhold medical information like this

[@michealwestfall8544]

My niece got diagnosed with type 1 at age 6. It put her in the hospital. It would have been nice to know. Though the blood test won't help, if the parents don't believe in medical screening.

[@zakm0n]

T1 juvenile diabetic here. Had my parents known i was going to be type 1 before i was diagnosed at 8, they could've got me used to a more diabetic friendly diet before i devekoped it and my life would be WAY WAY WAY WAY easier now

[@benjaminmoroni]

T1D here. My older brother is also a Diabetic. He went into ketoacidosis and was hospitalized for a week. A few years later, my family started noticing symptoms in me because they were already familiar with them and a doctor’s visit and blood test later, I was sent home with a prescription for insulin and that was it. Early warning can make all the difference.

[@waffles3629]

Yep. A friends family member became permanently dependently disabled at one due to being misdiagnosed by the pediatrician who never even checked their sugar levels because they were so young. They never learned exactly how high the kids blood sugar got because it capped out the hospital labs testing range, which went to like 900 (50). This could've changed their life, instead they have permanent brain damage and require nearly full time care.

[@PNW_Marxist]

Yeah, test your kids people, you could be saving their lives. Sorry people, but I'd much rather know and be able to plan than have it thrust upon me unexpectedly.

[@pattheplanter]

Parents, you don't want your child to suffer mild concern about their health? Would you rather they get permanent damage or death because some doctor or nurse doesn't realise what is going on soon enough while treating their medical crisis?

[@LoneIrbis]

Well, it's not something we can stop *now*, but it may be something that we could be able to do something about in 10 years or so. And if 10 years can easily pass between positive test result and actual diabetes, I'd personally still prefer knowing even as a toddler. If nothing else, it gives motivation to work towards finding a solution. It may even be enough for someone to decide on their future career, and we definitely need more people working on finding solutions to problems like this one.

[@waxwinged_hound]

I'm not a fan of putting the sponsor segment in the middle of the video. Maybe it's just because I'm autistic and can't adapt well to sudden changes, but it's really hard for me to absorb information this way. I get it's likely done this way because sponsors pay more for that, and I get that there is absolutely nothing I can do about this, I just thought I'd mention that it *does* get in the way of information retention.

[@einname9986]

I usually just skip through the sponsor section, this helps a lot

[@waxwinged_hound]

@@einname9986 It's the interruption itself that is enough. Having to suddenly run back to my PC and press the right arrow several times is enough of an interruption to throw off my entire process of absorbing information.

[@wiweYT]

You can use the sponsor block extension and if you're on mobile some 3rd party KZbin apps have it built in (for example LibreTube)

[@sprigsprog]

Agreed, it affects me the same. :( Don't like it and hate that educational youtube is beholden to sponsors as to how their shows are made. The intercut in the middle is distressing

[@StuffandThings_]

try sponsorblock

[@dragonflies6793]

I don't understand why so much focuses on potential psychological impact. This is literally a test that could save lives. Knowing more information is *always* better. I'm chronically, you know what caused me psychological harm? Thinking I was / had to be abled!

[@pattheplanter]

I think a lot of this is the still largely prevalent view that children are not really human beings but some sort of pet and they magically transform into adults at the legal age of majority.

[@waffles3629]

Same. Like it's better this than ending up in the ICU suddenly being poked with a bunch of needles and having to learn all this overnight.

[@MontyBeda]

But you never know when you will get it. You might get positive test at 1 year old but develop DM1 at 70 years old but living your whole live dreading when something will trigger your DM1. Is it really that helpful for that person? Because of this we have declined the test because we rather do not stress the other kid about the possibility she might also get insulin pump and sensor one day and we will have to stick needles in her regularly. She has enough fears about minor stuff anyway and just the thought of it happening to her makes her run scared away so that knowledge would not help at least in our case at all. It would be useful with the younger one to get the symptoms sooner and go to hospital sooner but we do not have a single risk factor for DM1 so the tests would have to be truly general to get our family.

[@amazinggrapes3045]

​​@@MontyBedaPeople have a right to know their own medical information so they can manage and plan their own lives. You don't have a right to keep it for them, no matter how much you imagine you're doing them a favor for it. If your child would "live their whole life in dread" because of it, you should really consider what you're doing to raise a person to have such psychological problems. Do you not want them to know they're gonna die, too? Disgusting.

[@MontyBeda]

@@amazinggrapes3045 It does not make any real difference. We know there is risk and she is well aware of it and kinda afraid of it anyway a lot of the times. So making the test would stress her as she hates getting blood drawn and then the test would hve to be negative to have any positive impact on our family. Otherwise the situation would be the same, maybe even more tense with that possibility. If she willl ever want that test taken than we will allow her to take it. At the moment she also does not want to know.

[@enckidoofalling2883]

Knowledge is better than ignorance. Or it’s denial.

[@decgal81]

I think it would be important to know and to educate the parents. I've read that how children handle big information is more reliant on how their parents deal with it than anything else. So yeah maybe the kids need some child therapy but the adults would definitely need therapy so they don't push their (realistic) fears onto children too young to cope.

[@DragonFae16]

Because food sensitivity ran in my father's family, from a young age my parents made me aware that one day I might not be able to eat something. That we should always hope that it doesn't happen, but that I should make sure to let them know if I had an unhappy tummy after eating. it wasn't something that I focused on. But having that warning meant that when it inevitably did happen, I could go 'Oh yeah, mum did say something like this might happen. This isn't scary.'

[@domomitsune5920]

I was told as a kid through routine blood test, that I had a much less severe form of this Keto blood problem. They told me just to eat a lot of protein daily, and that's all I had to do. They said that, my chances of diabetes was nearly zero, because I had this protein version of it, not sugar. Going down side, I can't donate blood. Contamination by acid problems. But I've managed it my entire life almost 40 Years of life, and there's been no real complications. I guess the only good thing is is, I can't donate blood so it's kind of good because I'm afraid of needles.

[@jamesmonschke747]

Ketoacidosis "risk" is almost an understatement. Statistically, each ketoacidosis incident carries a 5% to 8% chance of death, and a disproportionate portion of those deaths are associated with the first incidence when Type 1 diabetes has not yet been diagnosed, since the symptoms of ketoacidosis could also be from many other things that are far more common and much less serious, like a stomach flu. I have been type 1 diabetic for the last 40 years (diagnosed when 15). I was lucky in being diagnosed before I went into ketoacidosis.

[@pattheplanter]

If I had it, I would get a tattoo in several languages on my wrist.

[@paulest205]

In the US, not in other developed countries....

[@DarkMatterZine]

NO standard blood test predicts your future. For TEN YEARS I kept asking doctors to test me for Hermansky Pudlak Syndrome. All that was required was a (non-standard) blood test. For 10 years doctors refused, from GPs to haematologists. Then finally one haematologist agreed to to the test, which came up positive. 5 years later I moved interstate. A new haematologist said I could not possibly have HPS so ordered genetic testing. That too came up positive. These tests could well extend my life because, with these positive results, I’m getting better care. HPS is haemaphilia-adjacent. But a simple blood test available to many would have done nothing. I had to get the right gastroenterologist who found an 8cm gynocological cyst and who also referred me to her husband, a researcher studying platelet disorders (who’d never heard of HPS previously) in order to get the first test. In 1999 I nearly bled to - well, if not to death, certainly to hospital admission. No one knew why. An HPS diagnosis affects treatment and can save lives.

[@srpenguinbr]

It would be useful to kids in the US, their families could prepare to living abroad and avoiding astronomical healthcare costs

[@R.M.MacFru]

Let's bring up another factor of knowing early, and possibly preventing instances of ketoacidosis... the longer term secondary issues from the damage to the circulatory system. Type 1 diabetes usually, heralds a host of other issues due to the deterioration of blood vessels to major organs and limbs. These can be things sych as blindness, kidney failure, and gangrene in extremities. Early warning, and drugs that can delay the onset, are invaluable for mitigating the secondary results of diabetes. My mind boghles that there's any question about testing people; the question should be,how and when you tell your child. Not telling them, and sticking your head in the sand is a disservice to your child, and their future.

[@jordanschriver4228]

"Do you remember that MASH game we used to play at recess, where you'd try to predict your future house, job, pets, and stuff like that?" Wait, what? Most of my recess was Zombie-Tag.

[@meara628]

My baby cousin collapsed in the middle of us hiking hours away from a hospital with type 1. She is 9yrs old. No one knew she even remotely had it or symptoms. Sure she was a slightly butterball but she was also doing the "butterball then suddenly tall and slim-butterball again and sudden growth spurt" which yah know, normal. But no one in out family actively has diabeties. My Aunt's family has the gene we learned but it didnt develope for her. It was horrorfying seeing my baby cousin go down mid sentance and having to call search and rescue station and have her transported by helicopter because she would not wake up and remained unresponsive. She has to have an iv now for isnulin she will have for the rest of her life. If we had this test, if we had KNOWN she was at risk, we could have been more aware of sign. We almost lost her that day not getting to the hospital in time when she had seemingly been just fine and ate healthily and everything. I'd rather be aware from having taking the test that it was possible.

[@sarahchampoux2472]

My oldest son and my husband both have t1d. My husband didn't start showing symptoms until he was in his 20s, and was initially misdiagnosed as Type 2. My son, on the other hand, was diagnosed when he was just a couple months shy of his third birthday, at the hospital when he went into DKA. We're managing it well, now, as a family, building a functioning support system that accounts for mental health as well as the physical. For us, knowledge is indeed power. We've been keeping a close eye on the youngest of our two boys. So far, he hasn't been showing any of the earlier symptoms his older brother did, like being constantly thirsty. He's double the age his older brother was at diagnosis, but considering their father was well past that when he was diagnosed, that by no means he's never going to get it. Admittedly, we tend to get a bit anxious every time he has a tummy ache. As we always have glucose testing equipment in abundance, a quick finger poke has always been enough to assuage those concerns, at least for the short term ; but I wonder if this blood test would give us more definitive answers with regard to long-term prognosis. And would it even be worth it at this stage? Something to think about, for sure.

[@Crazy___Ginger]

This is a double edged sword. Sure, knowing you will develop diabetes will help you make better medical decisions, but it also raises a new spectre, insurance agencies denying coverage for your diabetes since it is a preexisting condition, and thus turns your medical problem into a severe financial problem.

[@LilliD3]

Only in the free country of the USA

[@kylehogan2247]

Mostly applies to the USA(both your comment and my own) , I'd argue most medical treatments can fall into this similar pattern unfortunately.

[@coltontindle]

The pancreas looks like a chicken tender

[@General12th]

Ironically something you should not eat during a diabetic emergency. Either a chicken tender or your own pancreas, I mean.

[@TimesRyan]

That's a rotted looking tender. Haha

[@jakefisher-psalm23]

@@General12th Not eating your own pancreas is a good life lesson for everyone.

[@kathleenwoods8416]

Still .makes me wonder how it fries up.

[@quadratichorizon]

@@jakefisher-psalm23 You say that jokingly, but there is an actual medical condition called pancreatic autodigestion. That's when pancreatic enzymes that normally don't become active until they're in the intestines, activate early and digest your pancreas from the inside.

[@tosfanax8322]

I developed asthma when I was 7 or 8 years old and when I was 22 I developed hypothyroidism. Both I will have for my entire life. Thyroid problem was harder for me because I was old enough to understand that the rest of my life was a long time. With the asthma it doesn't bother me as much because it's been a part of me for as long as I can remember.

[@FennecTECH]

The ability to diagnose type 1 before it happens would allow parents of affected children to have a fingerstick on hand and periodically check numbers preventing ketoacidosis entirely.

[@maggiegonzalez7637]

Just a quick reminder: type 1 diabetes can develop at ANY age. I got diagnosed at 33. This test shouldn’t just be for kids in my opinion.

[@srwapo]

"it could lead to... death. It's usually at this point when people go to the emergency room." Little late!

[@jenbanim]

"Yeah we could save you from experiencing a medical emergency that has a chance of killing or permanently disabling you, but it might make you nervous." What??

[@ACuriousTanuki]

Does this test only look for autoantibodies related to diabetes? What is the applicability of this type of testing to other autoimmune diseases?

[@Cocoanutty0]

I know they have other ones because that’s how I was diagnosed with one. But I had to tell my doctors to test me for it after years of no answers and finally doing my own research. A lot of great tests exist, doctors just don’t do them.

[@gilaharoni249]

It's not the first time a weird anti-science anti health segment was added. First they argued against helping hippos fight extinction or something, now they are against finding early a life threatening diseases. What's going on? Will the next ones be about the problems with vaccines? or maybe a discussion on the ethics of allowing abortions

[@mayaenglish5424]

It's not anti science, they presented the information and the various opinions about the subject. I personally think knowledge is power and they should test. But I do understand the concern about the psychological impacts on people and that should be incorporated into treatment. Perhaps counciling for children who recieve a positive diagnosis? In order to educate them about the disease and make it more digestable and less scary.

[@gilaharoni249]

@mayaenglish5424 No, they raise questions where there are no questions to be raised, and they promote illegitimate and even life-threatening opinions by talking about them as if they are legitimate. If you look at the comments, you'll see that many shared similar concerns, though they might have been less harsh. The other concern here is that, as I mentioned above, it's not the first time they've done this, and this is a cause for concern. Being a respected educational channel, they should be responsible and think about which ideas they're promoting. These anti-science, outlandish ethics ideas should stop being promoted here. Suppose that even one child didn't get treatment because of this video (and with 100k views, it's probably more than one) - think what could happen to him or her as a result. Now you can only imagine what their next "hot take" will be about. If they are willing to say things like that, risking children's lives, they are misguided enough to say anything.

[@anneanderson145]

9:00 Awesome kid.

[@I1like1wood1ash]

I really like scishow but that "what about the effects on the kid" is an absolutely ridiculous argument and downright harmful. If you teach them early in life that they'll need to stick to a certain routine to stay healthy when they're older, it won't turn them into a nervous wreck. Quite the opposite. It'll make the upcoming illness much more manageable because it'll already be normal to them. I'm saying this as someone with a disabling chronic illness which I developed as a teenager. The first flare-up was a nightmare: not knowing what was going on, being unsure if what i was experiencing was "real", fighting through it alone because i didn't have rhe words to describe it, and later having to make MASSIVE changes in lifestyle without any sort of due warning was incredibly traumatic. Not to mention having to radically change what I could expect out of my life. Compare that to the next major bout when i was diagnosed and informed: it was upsetting but i was already prepared and knew what to do. It was routine. I didn't have to make massive changes to my life or my expectations for the future because i'd been aware for years. Arguing that you shouldn't tell a child about an illness that is going to be a very big part of their life (and VERY SOON) is frankly disturbing, and vastly underestimates children's capacity to take things in stride.

[@pattheplanter]

Ignorance is very, very seldom a good thing to inflict on your children.

[@gabemerritt3139]

Exactly, ignorance doesn't benefit you at all when you are definitely going to experience a chronic disease either way. Knowing ahead of time can literally be life or death in the worst cases.

[@waffles3629]

Yep, and it means they and their parents aren't scrambling to learn this vital information basically overnight while terrified from a new diagnosis they likely know next to nothing about. I developed a chronic illness as an adult and it was rough then, I can't imagine doing it as a young kid with even less understanding (or maybe no) understanding of the body and how it works.

[@themsarichan]

TrialNet risk screening has been super important for families with T1D for the last couple of decades. I couldn't imagine choosing to have kids and not doing it. (I'm T1 with some family history of T1 on both sides)

[@Ryukachoo]

10:42 The thing is, aren't there multiple mrna based type 1 vaccines going into trials right now? So it isn't really inevitable, just something to keep and eye on

[@FalconFern-e6r]

Old age, and inevitably the disabilities, illness and pain, are the sword of Damacles hanging over all our heads. But we have our entire lives to come to terms with that and we see elderly people living openly and shamelessly about those problems and so we know older people can have good and happy and healthy lives even as they experience these things. The world would be much less scary if we accepted that disabilities come for us all eventually and that is normal and human and manageable, toddlers that will develop diabetes in the future will be fine

[@jamesmonschke747]

that 2 to 3 years delay in getting symptomatic Type 1 can also be significant because the younger someone is when they get type 1, the more likely it will be more difficult to control (what they used to call "brittleness"). I am not sure how well the mechanisms are understood, but my hypothesis has been that the body also has other secondary/tertiary/quarternary means of regulating blood sugar, and that those other mechanisms don't have a chance to fully develop/mature when somebody looses the primary mechanism for controlling blood sugar at an early age.

[@paulest205]

The delay is really bad. I got DM Type 1 long ago. I must say its better to get oit early, because I have no memory before my diabetes. I know a lot of people with DM Type 1 that got it in their teens, that is really really much worse, because for me a live without this desease is not in my brain, people who got it later have memories of a live without it, that can be a really bad thing....

[@matozbrunoz]

@@paulest205 Hi, I understand what you mean. As a father of a 4-year-old (who was diagnosed with ketoacidosis at 2 years old), and someone with LADA myself (diagnosed at exactly the same time as my son, I'm 45), I can't express enough how much I wished I had known in advance what would happen to him. If it had been in my power to delay it, I would have done so without hesitation. Unfortunately, symptoms of ketoacidosis in the early stages may not be so evident, because a home capillary blood test with a simple glucometer would prevent many cases of ketoacidosis. We know that, now.

[@sandreawhite7534]

Absolutely never this would fall into the hands of insurance providers and then have an excuse not to cover you. I’d never do this.

[@cailinanne]

Children deserve the informed part of the informed consent put into language they will understand. And I think every parent of a kid who’s been in KAD would have been happy to have had this test BEFORE.

[@lenabreijer1311]

Any half decent parent can help a kid deal with this by educating themselves and their child. There is diabetes type 2 in my family and we have all known since the 1950s that this is a problem that hangs over our heads, several old family members have died from it. We have all been educated on it as well as allergies of all kinds. This test should be part of blood work panel for every kid .

[@CaptainMarvelsSon]

As soon as he started describing the pancreas, I suddenly started thinking about the Weird Al Yankovic song by the same name.

[@hughcaldwell1034]

As someone who's known they were going blind since the age of six or seven, I'd say kids are way better at incorporating serious diagnoses into their mental models of themselves/the world than we give them credit for. We need to stop conflating ignorance and innocence.

[@waffles3629]

Exactly. You can present almost anything kids need to know in a way they can understand and process. Obviously when you get to young enough ages there is a communication barrier, but kids grow up pretty fast and are little learning sponges that soak up so much.

[@hughcaldwell1034]

@@waffles3629 They soak it up, and moreover they build part of their mindset around it. I remember my sister cried when she found out just how little I could see, and I was just confused because, as far as I was concerned, that was just the way things were. There's less betrayal of expectations. Compare that to my partner, who grew up healthy, had an idea of what she wanted from life, went to uni, then had to cut her degree short thanks to ME/CFS. She got all the time to imagine an independent life for herself and none of the time to execute it; at least, not in the way she imagined. Now in her case there was no way of knowing ahead of time, but forewarned is forearmed, so if one has that opportunity it seems foolish not to take it.

[@Shinntoku]

My brain this whole video: 🎵 Insulin, Glucagon, coming from the islets of Langerhans🎵

[@klutterkicker]

Speaking as someone who had a different "sword of Damocles" as a kid, the parents take it worse (and are probably more risk to he kid's psyche than the diagnosis itself).

[@nascenticity]

i’m 100% in the camp that keeping information like this from kids does absolutely nothing to help them. if anything, knowing about a condition years before you develop it can give you time to adjust and mentally prepare yourself, and allow you to handle the actual illness much better than if it is sprung on you out of nowhere. there are so many people on this planet who wish they’d had answers sooner. and what’s more, we’re *all* guaranteed to develop some kind of significant health issues if we live long enough. the idea that knowing you’ll get sick one day is some kind of profound psychological trauma that will scar a person for life only really exists in a society where people think of diseases as something that happen to Other People, usually ones who made Bad Choices, and where anything less than full health is seen as deeply shameful. we’d do much more for kids mental health by normalizing talking about chronic conditions like diabetes and dispelling the ableist myths that surround a lot of this kind of thing. not to mention fixing the healthcare systems that make some conditions exponentially more stressful than they need to be…

[@militantpacifist4087]

Mine says that I’m going to die.

[@scriptorpaulina]

There’s two other kinds of diabetes mellitus though-the kind caused by cystic fibrosis (which has features of both insulin resistance and insufficiency) and the kind where you never had insulin-producing cells (rather than being caused by autoimmunity).

[@Louis-kw6yk]

the second one is 100% genetic?

[@scriptorpaulina]

@@Louis-kw6yk no

[@thesjkexperience]

I was told when I was an early teen I might lose my eyesight due to how my eyes are. I’m now in my early 60s and it’s happening😮. I’m so glad I didn’t wait until retirement to do things, I went and did things. Quit watching tv when I got a driving license and did, and learned , so many things. Yes, it still really sucks, but technology will allow me to learn and have great experiences as my world goes dark. 🎉😊

[@Jpanda16]

that would be like taking a test to find out whether or not you'll have menstruation. you can't prevent it from happening, you don't know when it will start, but you will need to learn about toxic shock syndrome if you want to live.

[@TerkanTyr]

The way I see it, the test is better viewed as whether or not you "have" diabetes than whether or not you'll get it, like HIV and other passive diseases. Even if it's not technically correct. Would you not want to know if you have a passive disease, whether or not its activation is guaranteed?

[@LucyRoseLuna]

I outsmarted procrastination by watching scishow videos like this one

[@Wisthler]

I have Typ 1 Diabetes and yes it was at that time, an emergancy too before they found the cause. I was 1,5 years old and in the past it was not always so easy to diagnose.

[@metroid031993]

I think the ethics are, in fact, pretty well cut and dry. Any parent worth their salt would minimize the amount that any kid has to deal with it, and in plenty of other cases even if the kid knows and has to deal with that knowledge, it can be minimized still, and they and people around them probably know to keep a closer eye on them in their later medical checkups. Not to mention that having a huge medical emergency is probably more traumatic than it'll ever be to know you have to watch to see if you need to take insulin. I'm sure there are edge cases and exceptions, and there's some amount of discretion I think that should be left to doctors, but by and large, people should know beforehand so they can monitor the situation and prevent a medical emergency.

[@Couchintheclouds]

You know I found out there is a genetic test for the same type of dementia that killed my mom, and not only is it too expensive for me to afford but also I am not sure having that information is going be helpful to me in the long run. Specially when there is no effective treatment for it.

[@papyrusisverycool2372]

you guys are great

[@PaulADAigle]

I'll be so glad when AI/AGI can organize and help us humans to know all this stuff right away. I feel overwhelmed and I just watch these tidbits for interesting entertainment.

[@HG-gj9lh]

My mother has type one and wasn’t diagnosed until her late 30’s. I didn’t know onset was possible in adults until she was diagnosed.

[@digitalatom6433]

Another nasty symptom of ketoacidosis is that you'll start breathing out acetone (nail polish remover) due to how the increased acidity of your blood messes with your metabolism. The chemical is known to have a sweet, somewhat burning smell, so if you notice someone's breath smells almost sickly sweet (and you're sure it's not because of any sweets in their mouth) then you should get to a doctor. Acetone is often used in chemical labs as an extra-strong solvent for non-polar chemicals and a killer of micro-organisms, so in otther words, the chemical big boi of a cleaning chemical which is used when a 90% alcohol solution doesn't do the trick, so yeah... it's serious stuff. If you like, take a look at the citrus cycle, which describes how your body metabolises sugars and fats, both of which go down a different tree of chemicals, some of which, if you know your stuff, are pretty dangerous. Another side-effect of increased acidity can be the formation of crystals in the blood in the presence of certain metals, such as calcium and magnesium. In ionic form, these metals won't react with any free-flowing protons, since they've already got a positive charge, but reactions with carbon and sulphur will definitely kickstart a nasty chemical process that is sure to kill you. Speaking of carbon, Carbon dioxide likes to react with water to create carbonic acid, and the more acidic the solution is, the more this reaction will take place, at least, if I remember correctly. In other words, ketoacidosis can turn your blood into fizz. And also, the increased acidity will react with your bones, so... yeah your bones will start melting, or more accurately, literally dissolved. That will make your blood a lot thicker (and it also creates Calcium Hydroxide, otherwise known as soda, which is a basic chemical, so that may counteract the acidity for a while. All in all it's fascinating and very lethal.

[@angeloflifelight]

I got Type 1 at age 6. I think the fear of insurance hiking your rates is valid but it might be helpful for parents to know and what to look out for. No family history of it, I went to pee just before mom took me to school. It hurt so bad I screamed bloody murder and mom thought I had a UTI. The doctor said my bloodsugar was over 500 and I was in diabetic ketoacidosis. They asked when I had been sick, and I had some nasty stomach bug a week or so prior. Apparently that's when my body started attacking myself. Since I was pretty young I ended up adjusting to this change in my life pretty well, I've met adults who've struggled with it. If the child does not become diabetic as a child, the parents can inform them of it when they are older, so they can be ready.

[@raphaelgarcia9576]

Thank you for this

[@gaeshows1938]

Fate is sealed

[@eleanorwershow7183]

If you know early you can ease into lifestyle changes instead of having to change everything at once. I think most kids would not spend a lot of time thinking about it. The future is a very nebulous thing when you are six.

[@Shparky]

I clicked on the video assuming this was a reference to Machine of Death story collection, not something terrifying.

[@NousSpeak]

It's probably depends a LOT on the organism in interaction with their environment. People often forget how important environment is as a factor in genetics as well.

[@ZedaZ80]

Having to explain "no, I'm not saying 'Diabetes', I'm saying 'Diabetes Insipidus'" has been annoying because my family has no history of diabetes [mellitus] and doctors keep putting a family history of "diabetes" in my chart. I don't want bad info in my health info. The two are completely unrelated diseases. Anyways, it was wild to hear the two mentioned side by side here!

[@chucktaylor9164]

I did not know that the immune system attacks the pancreas. My immune system attacked my adrenal glands which gave me Addison's disease.

[@glorywr]

Ketones are not a problem. Ketones in the presence of high blood sugar is. For a non-diabetic you're either in ketosis or have enough blood sugar to produce energy from glucose. Not both. When you're diabetic though, your cells can be starving for energy and sending out those panic signal, making your body start to produce ketones out of your fat stores, AND your blood sugar can be high because there's not enough insulin in your blood to push the sugar into the cells. It's not the ketones, its the sugar mixing with the ketones.

[@stevebulbowmd7142]

Well, I´ve been treating patients with DM I & II[incl. insulin resistance], to get them off of insulin, since 2005!

[@mattshu]

Missed opportunity for naming it supercali-diabetic-ketoacidosis I'll be going now

[@robertfindley921]

Well, in the United States there is one thing that is absolutely certain about this test..... it makes huge amounts of profit.

[@msidrusbA]

so all in all, yes is the answer. why would you ever turn down the chance to know if you will develop an autoimmune disorder, as someone who has one i'd have loved to be taught what this meant when i was a kid...

[@scoston8884]

There are other major diseases that are hereditary and people have to learn to expect it. If science wants to know about how this affects people, especially children; they need to take a look around and start asking the right questions.

[@R1987R]

The assumption from this video is that the results would be made aware to the kids. But also that as young as 2 or 3 they would be tested. Why would I share that with my 3 year old? But it would be super handy for the parents to keep it in the back of their minds that when they start showing symptoms at sa age 8, you don't wait months before you go see a medical professional.

[@samlindsey8978]

Forwarned is forarmed - at least for the parents in this case. This enables them to know to ask for successive testing, to watch out for certain things that they might otherwise think are fully mundane and actually get the chance to decide if the medication that can prevent the onset of the diabetes is worth whatever risks it presents for themselves instead of everyone being surprised and the child potentially dying or ending up with permanent damage of some kind on top of having to deal with the diabetes in a traumatic event.

[@Hotshot2k4]

I think the case is pretty clear that these test *should* be performed, at least once, on all kids. The question shouldn't be whether or not to do the test, but whether or not to tell the kids what the test was/what the results of the test were.

[@pattheplanter]

I suppose most parents assume they are immortal and when the day finally comes that their child ends up in hospital they can say - oh yeah, you got diabetes. There is no justifiable case for not telling the child what to look out for so they can have agency in their own health choices.

[@jayceewedmak9524]

If the kids are young the parents need to start preparing meals the kid will have to eat in the future. Type 1 meals are quite yummy so no problem and easy enough for kids to help with! Parents are responsible to create emotionally, psychologically and physically healthy kids - love your kids, tell them around 10 - 12 years old over a great meal that half the battle is won by knowing.

[@DelfinaKS]

If you test negative does not mean you are in the clear for life. So at least once does not mean anything.

[@corlisscrabtree3647]

Thank you 🙏

[@hashtagmrfluff]

I was diagnosed with type 1 at age 20, very suddenly, right as Covid lockdowns started. My dad just thought I was overreacting to having a bad cold. No one else in my family has type one either. I had a hunch that it was caused by environmental factors that turned my immune system on itself because of a predisposition, but it’s nice to know that I’m correct 😂 I didn’t realize how bad DKAs could get either tbh, and I’m glad my parents and I didn’t put off going to the hospital for any longer after the vomitting started. I puked like three times in eight hours lmfao. Being a freshman in college and dealing with Covid lockdowns AND getting type one alongside DKA is NOT something that was on my 2020 bingo card 😂😂😂

[@CresentWolf]

Wait so....when are these tests available?

[@arjunrastogi4640]

See knoeing about wat disease u can potentially get is always going to be better than not knowing about it knowledge is power so if i know i m at more risk of a certain disease i would do everything in my power to reduce the chances of getting it or atleast reduce the chances of its risk increasing i was pre diabetic in 8 th grade if i didn't got the blood test then i might have developed diabetes but now i have reversed it i used the information i had then and stopped situation from getting worse

[@kazzellinempanger8998]

Oddly, my only question about this video was why you only showed finger pricks for testing blood sugar? Is the AlphaTrack monitor not good for kids? (My cat has/had one--the beeping for testing her blood sugar scared her, so we stopped using it and went back to ear pricks.)

[@smolseaturtle]

Will the blood tell me if will take over the world someday? 👉👈🥺

[@pattheplanter]

Like many rare problems, global dictatoring is just not encountered enough for much research to be done.

[@kearstinnekenerson6676]

I feel like it might be work it because you can monitor for it and pick it up early if it does happen but we should also work on figuring out the triggers at the same time so we can then test for it and let people know what the triggers would be

[@sophierobinson2738]

I have RA. The people at Oncology are very good at keeping my iron and white count up.

[@OLBAPPOAWECBRKLFK]

I wonder what is up in my case, I got tested after diagnosis (had lost 11 kg in a month, was peeing upwards of 12 times a night, etc)... however my AAbs did not become detectable until 3 years had passed after my diagnosis..

[@victoriaeads6126]

I think I would do it for my kids if they were offered this test. There are plenty of illnesses that present in childhood, and we have developed ways to help kids cope. I was born with severe asthma and allergies, and I just learned how to live with them and manage my symptoms. That's the better future for a kid with this diagnosis, especially if it means they could avoid a major emergency event.

[@MontyBeda]

My youngest has DM1 for over two and half years now. On insulin pump luckily so we manage. But we have decided we do not want the test for older one because we have none of the risk factors in either family and we now know how to recognize if DM1 is starting and we can test glucose levels at home to diagnose at home if needed.