The Happy Pod: Diabetes Awareness Month special
Global News Podcast
BBC
4.2 • 7.8K Ratings
🗓️ 29 November 2025
⏱️ 34 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In this special episode we're marking Diabetes Awareness Month with a range of stories about innovation, advocacy and education -- including a book helping children newly diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes. It began as a university project for Lea Leleta Sümer, who's from Bosnia-Herzegovina and has lived with the condition since she was two years old. She wanted to help children like her come to terms with their condition, as well as educate others.
Also: The Barbie Doll with Type 1 diabetes - a collaboration from Mattel and the international diabetes charity, Breakthrough T1D. We meet the women who inspired the doll.
We speak to Sally TM, of RuPaul's Drag Race UK fame, who was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes around the age of 10. Sally uses her art and platform to advocate for people living with the condition.
As Italy becomes the first country to implement a nationwide screening programme, we hear from the man who has pioneered it.
Plus a teacher who's broken the world record for the fastest marathon by a male with type 1 diabetes. And we find out how recent advances in technology have made the daily management of the condition easier and safer, and consider what's to come.
Our weekly collection of inspiring, uplifting and happy news from around the world.
Presenters: Harry Bligh and Alex Ritson. Music composed by Sarah Warren
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, podcasts. |
| 0:10.4 | Hello and welcome to a slightly different happy pod from the BBC World Service. |
| 0:20.6 | I'm Harry Bly. |
| 0:22.3 | And I'm Alex Ritson. |
| 0:23.9 | In this edition, we're marking Diabetes Awareness Month, |
| 0:26.8 | highlighting stories about innovation, advocacy and education. |
| 0:31.2 | Like Leia, whose children's book has helped children come to terms with diagnosis. |
| 0:36.4 | The woman who inspired a type 1 diabetic Barbie doll. |
| 0:39.8 | How one drag queen here in the UK is using her platform to raise awareness of diabetes. |
| 0:45.3 | Plus Italy, which has become the first country to implement a nationwide type 1 diabetes screening |
| 0:51.2 | program. |
| 0:56.2 | But before we get started, let's talk about what diabetes actually is. |
| 1:01.5 | It's a range of conditions where there's essentially too much sugar in your bloodstream. |
| 1:06.0 | It's estimated more than 9 million people around the world have type 1 diabetes, including me and Alex. |
| 1:13.2 | But there are others, type 2, and the differences are, well, essentially type 1 is an autoimmune condition. |
| 1:20.0 | We don't yet know, doctors don't yet know, what causes type 1 diabetes. |
| 1:24.2 | And then there's type 2, which is more lifestyle related. There are other factors |
| 1:28.8 | such as age, family history and ethnicity, and then a couple of rarer sorts, gestational, |
| 1:34.9 | people have it during pregnancy and other forms that develop during adulthood. And it's a |
| 1:39.9 | condition that has many misconceptions. The symptoms of a low blood sugar attack are similar to drunkenness |
| 1:46.7 | and many a young person has suffered badly or even died because of that. And with pressure to avoid |
| 1:52.4 | those low sugar attacks, many people allow their sugars to run high. But high sugars over time |
... |
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