Great news for diabetics

Those who live with the daily challenge of monitoring and regulating their blood sugar know only too well how difficult it can be to keep the numbers under control. For some, a culture of food and sedentary living has led to an increased incidence of Type II Diabetes, but for others, there are no apparent reasons why this condition strikes.

In recent weeks, I've heard more than once that a daily dosage of cinnamon is extremely effective in lowering blood sugar. Here's one report:

Want to keep your blood sugar down to lower your odds of developing diabetes? Or
if you are diabetic, would you like to lower blood glucose further without extra
drugs? Try eating more cinnamon or taking cinnamon capsules.That's the
advice of Richard Anderson, PhD researcher at the US Department of Agriculture.
'I know of no other natural ingredient that has the power cinnamon does in
controlling blood sugar,' he says in a radiointerview with Jean Carper. In fact,
Anderson said he takes cinnamon to control his own blood sugar and normally high
cholesterol with astonishing success. His cholesterol plunged 60 points after he
started getting about ¼ teaspoon of cinnamon twice a day, he says. Anderson has
reported similar results in a group of 60 people with type 2 diabetes in
Diabetes Care, a journal of the American Diabetes Association. In those getting
as little as 1 gram of cinnamon (1/4 tsp twice a day), blood sugar dropped
18 to 29%, triglycerides fell 23 to 30%, LDL bad cholesterol went down 7 to 27%
and total cholesterol 12 to 26%. That's comparable to what you can expect from
statin cholesterol-lowering drugs, he says. And cinnamon, unlike drugs, has no
side effects. What's also amazing, says Anderson, is that the benefits of
cinnamon lasted for 20 days after subjects stopped taking it. Whereas the
benefits of statin drugs vanish very quickly after you stop taking them, he
says. You can sprinkle cinnamon on cereals, put it in juices, use it in desserts
such as apple pie and make tea using a cinnamon stick.

Who knows whether it will work.