These people may contact me and become members of VIDIS (Viruses in Diabetes International Study Group)
Why viruses? I know someone said that T1DM might be an unknown virus promoting an auto immune reaction but I can't find any evidence to support this assumption. Is there any epidemiological evidence to point to an infectious agent? Recent findings that there is still residual beta-cell activity in T1DM patients seems contrary to the total destruction of functioning beta-cells by an auto immune response. I also know that I can not find any biopsy data to show the absence of beta-cells nor any tests to find out if biopsied beta-cells can regain function when exposed to normal signalling in vitro.
In my own T2DM, I have found that symptoms and complications were caused by signalling failure due to the effects of C. novyi type A alpha toxin on hexamine signalling pathways. I have achieved remission with antibiotic (erythomycin) treatment alone and Hb1A results anti-correlate with frequency of antibiotic use. Neuropathy, renal dysfunction, and even the wild angiopathy in my right eye have all cleared up.
So, I ask the question, why just viruses when there is a bacterial toxin which the literature shows to be capable of causing all the observed effects?
Of course there is interest for other microbial agents. The gut microbiome is one topic, together wit particular bacterial species (e.g., Mycobacterium paratuberculosis, toxin-producing bacteria, etc.). Virus infections, however, seem more consistently associated with type 1 diabetes. Chronic HCV infection has been associated with type 2 diabetes - the association seems, however, to be fading..
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