Why Isn’t More Being Done About Autoimmune Diseases?
Even though the number of those who suffer from autoimmune diseases has more than tripled in the three decades since my father died, this still remains a silent epidemic. Consider these facts: 1) Ninety percent of people still say they can’t name a single autoimmune disease.
2) Autoimmune disease research still gets one-tenth the funding of cancer (despite the fact that autoimmunity afflicts close to three times the number of people).
3) Autoimmune disease is still not a reportable disease (doctors don’t have to report data to any national registry when a patient is diagnosed with autoimmune disease — the way they must when a patient is diagnosed with cancer) so we still don’t really know how many people really have these diseases. Indeed, our ballpark number of 24 million may be much lower than the reality.
For decades, not much happened in terms of our progress in diagnosing and treating these diseases, either. But we’re now entering a new era of understanding as to how these diseases attack the body and how to treat them – not just with emerging drugs but with a whole new range of approaches that are often driven by patients searching for a road to wellness.
We can share that knowledge today as never before and help change the course of these diseases.
What do you think needs to happen — on a national level?
Donna Jackson Nakazawa is a nationally acclaimed researcher, writer and public speaker on health and family issues. She is the author of the recent book, The Autoimmune Epidemic.
July 5th, 2008 at 4:38 pm
Donna,
I AM A 48 YEAR OLD MALE SUFFERING FROM WHAT MY DRS REFUSE TO CALL LUPUS BECAUSE IM A MAN, I HAVE ALL THE SIGNS AND SYMPTOMS BUT SOME ARE [STRONGER] THAN OTHERS. ANYWAYS, MY THOUGHT ON WHY THERE IS SO LITTLE RESERCH ON AUTOIMUNITY IS DOCTORS HATE IT BECAUSE IT IS SO HARD TO DIAGNOSE, THEY DONT REALLY WANT TO TREAT ME BECAUSE THEY JUST DONT KNOW WHAT IS WRONG. THE SIGNS AND SYMPTOMS CAN VARY OVER TIME AND DEVELOPE INTO OTHER SYMPTOMS AND THEY SELDOM CAN TELL ME WHAT IS WRONG. I AM THE PATIENT DRS HATE TO SEE COME IN THEIR OFFICE ,BECAUSE THE JUST DONT KNOW HOW TO TREAT ME. THEY CAN ONLY TRY TO TREAT THE SYMPTOMS AND CANT TREAT THE DISEASE. AUTOIMUNITY: THE DISEASE DRS HATE TO TREAT.