Type 2 diabetes just got an unexpected poster child - Oscar winning actor Tom Hanks after the star revealed he had the disease during Monday night's Late Show with David Letterman.
In an interview with David Letterman (watch video below), Hanks shared he has battled high blood sugar since the age of 36. Hanks appeared on the talk show to promote his latest movie "Captain Phillips."
"I went to the doctor and he said, 'You know those high blood-sugar numbers you've been dealing with since you were 36? Well, you've graduated! You've got Type 2 diabetes, young man.'"
Hanks said. "I said to her, 'Well, I'm going to have Type 2 diabetes, because there's no way I can weigh as much as I did in high school.'"
Hanks' high school weight: 96 pounds. "Most of it was that big, wide afro," Hanks said.
After all, "something's gonna kill us all, Dave," he joked.
Type 2 diabetes is a chronic disease in which there are high levels of glucose in the blood, which is called hyperglycemia. It affects the body by either not producing enough insulin, the hormone that turns sugar into energy, or by resisting insulin.
Type 2 diabetes is the most common form of diabetes. There is currently no cure for type 2 diabetes, but it can be managed with a healthy diet regular exercise and maintaining a healthy weight. It affects about 24 million Americans and accounts for the more than 90 percent of diabetes cases diagnosed in the United States, according to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
"There's no question that the growth of diabetes both in the United States and around the world is at epidemic proportions," says Robert Ratner, the chief scientific and medical officer for the American Diabetes Association. He's an endocrinologist and diabetologist.
Other celebrities, including Sherri Shepherd, Halle Berry, Paula Deen, Patti LaBelle and Drew Carey, also have been diagnosed with the type 2 diabetes.
Watch the interview with Tom Hanks below:
