Posted by Dennis on September 23, 2002 at 12:33:44:
In Reply to: Re: ADA - : The fleecing of the sick posted by Mac Dana on September 20, 2002 at 21:16:26:
In no way was I speaking directly to the child in the story or the parent. I Have no clue the subjects in the story even log on to this site or ever will. If I met the kid I'd say nothing but good things for his involvemnet. My comment was for my longstanding belief that the ADA's budget funds treatment related issues rather than cure research. Only 15 cents on the dollars raised by the largest diabetes organization in the US goes towards a cure. Personally, I think that is too low, and in order for a cure to be funded I think we need to talk about the problem. I don't advocate for anything radical to be done, I only want to bring discussion to the area of how the dollars raised by the ADA are allocated. Please do not misconstrue my effort as being at all against the subjescts in the stroy, on the contrary, I care more about people with the disease than you know. Unfortunately convenient for the ADA's current budget committee, and anyone looking for something I have said to attack, if I advocate for an increase in the allocation of dollars toward cure research, it entails the reductuon of dollars spent in other areas. That does not make me a foe of the beneficiaries of the other programs. In the end we all I think, want a cure.
It's a frustrating disease, we must remember its the disease that is the enemy, not each other. As for your comment that I'm all anger and no action, I have met and called a local politician that has resulted in him signing a piece of legislation to ask for an increase in diabetes research funding, I have participated in several fund and awareness raising events, I have written several politicians, visited and corresponded with researchers and businesses working on cure research and have had two articles published in local newspapers raising awareness for the need of a cure.
Its been a year since my daughter's diagnoses, and during that time have attained all of her A1cs under 6 - knock on wood.
Mac, I don't know you, so please tell me what you have done to help out.
Dennis