BC is the Best Place in the World to Have Diabetes*

Living With Diabetes, Patient Care + Research + Clinical Trials, Technology

Author: Tristan Elliott

A message from Dr. Elliott:

Nobody would ever choose to have diabetes, but if you had to choose the best place in the world to live with Type 1 diabetes you might well choose British Columbia.  So wrote Dr. Ben Mammon in an email to me late Friday night, the same day BC’s Minister of Health Adrian Dix announced Pharmacare coverage of the Dexcom G6 for more than 40,000 British Columbians living with Type 1 diabetes and Type 2 diabetes on multiple shots of insulin.  Ben knows as he has had Type 1 diabetes since the age of 12, and since 2019 has been advising BCDiabetes on technology.

CGM means sleeping through the night without fear of low sugar, almost no finger pokes, better control & better outcomes and access to automatic insulin delivery otherwise known as the artificial pancreas, a technological cure for diabetes. Since 2018 Pharmacare has covered insulin pumps for all; now with with CGM coverage automatic insulin delivery is possible today with Loop, fabulous DIY software available for installation at BCDiabetes (note Loop is not Health Canada approved).  

BC might just be the best place in the world to live for people living with Type 2 diabetes as well.  CGM is one reason; two other reasons are Pharmacare coverage within the last 2 years of semaglutide by weekly shot, and empagliflozin as a daily pill, medications that both safely lower sugar and weight as well as reduce cardiovascular and kidney risk.

“Why the asterisk in the title?” asks my wife Veronica as I type this blog sitting on the couch with her on a rainy Vancouver Sunday afternoon. I reply, “The asterisk is to remind our readers that Mr. Dix still has work to do before I let up on him”.

Minister Dix, what you and your Pharmacare team have achieved with such broad CGM coverage is momentous and is being celebrated across the province.  Yet British Columbians living with diabetes urgently deserve more to bring their quality of life closer to that of the rest of the population. Below is my short list for your attention.

• Calculating the Pharmacare Deductible on a monthly basis by default for British Columbians living with chronic conditions including diabetes.  For an example see this scenario.
• Finding a solution for Medtronic 670G & 770G pump users who find their Pharmacare-covered closed-loop capable pumps orphaned without CGM coverage.
• Full Pharmacare coverage of rapid insulin.