The symptoms of this common disease creep up slowly but surely and its affects devastating. In Jamaica, 18% of the population suffers from diabetes. In Barbados, 17% of the island’s population over 40 has diabetes. In St. Lucia it is estimated at 8. The prevalence of diabetes among Afro-Caribbean people is a growing concern in the United Kingdom (UK) as well, with 1.8 million people already diagnosed with the illness.

According to Diabetes Education: Training Trainers in the Caribbean, "It is estimated that by the year 2010, the number of people with diabetes in the Caribbean will reach 20 million."Valerie, a 40 year old attorney, collapsed in court, right in the middle of arguing a case that was certain to make her a legal eagle in the Virgin Islands. "I had been feeling lousy for days; extremely dizzy, but I ignored the signs. The next thing I know, I find myself being wheeled out of court on a stretcher going to the hospital." Valerie had joined the ranks of millions around the globe riddled with diabetes.

KEEP A FOOD DIARY TO HELP BOOST WEIGHT LOSS

The simple — and free — act of keeping a food diary can double a person’s weight loss, according to a study from Kaiser Permanente’s Center for Health Research in Portland, Oregon. The findings, from one of the largest and longest-running weight-loss-maintenance trials ever conducted, were published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.

Funded by the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute at the National Institutes of Health, this study is one of the few to recruit a large percentage of African Americans as participants (44 percent). According to the researchers, African Americans have a higher-than-average risk of conditions that are aggravated by being overweight, including diabetes and heart disease.

"The more food records people kept, the more weight they lost," says lead author Jack Hollis, Ph.D. "Those who kept daily food records lost twice as much weight as those who kept no records. It seems that the simple act of writing down what you eat encourages people to consume fewer calories."