RESEARCH GROUPS around the world are optimistic that they are making progress towards developing the drug insulin in a form that can be taken by mouth. Many diabetics must inject themselves every day with insulin to help control the level of sugar in their blood. For decades, scientists have been looking for an effective way to give people insulin by mouth instead.
Insulin is an essential hormone for getting glucose from the bloodstream into body cells, and most people produce it naturally in the pancreas. People with diabetes mellitus produce either not enough insulin or none at all. The hormone cannot normally be taken by mouth because insulin molecules are destroyed by digestive enzymes in the gut. Thus many diabetics must inject themselves with insulin daily.
Researchers have therefore been aiming to package the hormone in some way so that it can survive intact in the gut and cross the ...
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