I'd be dead if it wasn't for this man...

Frederick Banting was a Canadian who, in 1921, was one of the main discoverers of insulin, which was achieved by keeping a diabetic dog alive using daily injections of canine pancreas extract. For this and his subsequent research, he won the Nobel Prize for medicine in 1923 and was knighted in 1934. His discovery has saved the lives of hundreds of thousands of people ever since, me included.

I have been diabetic since I was 15. I didn't get it because of bad diet or little exercise; I got it because my body started destroying the cells that produce insulin. This is sometimes know as Type 1 diabetes and it's an auto-immune disease.

Diabetes is one of those conditions that everyone thinks they know about but in most cases, they do not. The myths about diabetes are many:

You get diabetes because of a bad diet
You get diabetes because of lack of exercise
You can't eat sweet things if you're a diabetic
You can't drive if you're diabetic
You get ill all the time if you're diabetic
You have to eat special diabetic food if you're diabetic
Diabetes is contagious

Incidences of diabetes are increasing worldwide and especially so in the west. The cost of treating diabetics and keeping us healthy is huge but that bill becomes even bigger if we are left untreated and lose our health.

There's a rather good article on the BBC's website today that outlines the initial research on diabetes undertaken by Frederick Banting.