About this episode
This episode discusses the history of diabetes treatments and the scientists behind them.
Diabetes has been recognised as a fatal condition for thousands of years: its symptoms are described in ancient Chinese, Sanskrit and Greek texts. But it wasn’t until the late 19th century that its cause began to be understood, as scientists conducted experiments on dogs. It was a pair of researchers at the University of Toronto in the early 1920s who – through a gruelling series of experiments that would not pass an ethics review today – eventually isolated the hormone that patients with diabetes are lacking. On this episode, Liam Shaw, who reviewed the latest edition of Michael Bliss’s classic book The Discovery of Insulin in a recent issue of the LRB, joins Thomas Jones to discuss the history of diabetes treatments from insulin to Ozempic, the all-too-human scientists who discovered them and the companies that profit from them. Read Liam’s piece: https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v48/n06/liam-shaw/bring-me-bimagrumab From the LRB Subscribe to the LRB: https://lrb.me/subslrbpod Close Readings podcast: https://lrb.me/crlrbpod LRB Audiobooks: https://lrb.me/audiobookslrbpod Bags, binders and more at the LRB Store: https://lrb.me/storelrbpod Get in touch…
People in this episode
Host: Thomas Jones
Guest: Liam Shaw
Topics covered
- diabetes
- insulin
- medical history
- scientific discovery
- pharmaceutical industry
Keywords
- diabetes
- insulin
- Ozempic
- medical ethics
- scientific research
Mentioned in this episode
Organizations: University of Toronto, Michael Bliss, LRB
Books & works: The Discovery of Insulin
More episodes of The LRB Podcast
- Poetry and the Turning World: Work · June 10, 2026 · 1h 5m
- On Politics: Myths of Populism · June 3, 2026 · 1h 12m
- Jane Austen's ‘Emma’ and the art of misreading · May 30, 2026 · 1h 8m
- Gaza after the Ceasefire · May 27, 2026 · 1h 10m
- A Rough Guide to Money Laundering · May 20, 2026 · 46 min
- When will AI replace us? · May 14, 2026 · 43 min
Explore listener stats, chart rankings, contacts and more on the The LRB Podcast podcast page.