Giving insulin for type 2 diabetes adds gas to the fire. The symptom of type 2 diabetes is high glucose, but the problem is high insulin. Patients already make too much insulin and resist it. So more insulin deepens that resistance. It drives more fat storage and weight gain.
Keeping up insulin treatment in type 2 diabetes keeps causing trouble in the body. That can lead to more serious diseases over time. We need to tell symptoms apart from problems, or we throw more fuel on the fire. Insulin is both a signaling hormone and a growth hormone. It makes cells such as muscle and liver take in blood sugar. It also turns glucose in the blood into stored fat. Take insulin away, and these fat stores shrink and turn into ketones. Ketones are a fuel the body makes by breaking down fat (lipolysis and ketogenesis).
In type 1 Diabetes, patients cannot make insulin. They must have some source of outside insulin. Or their diet must be strictly controlled and tracked with a continuous glucose monitor. Without strict control or an outside source of insulin, ketone making gets out of control. At the same time, blood sugar rises. It causes acute acidosis (the blood turns too acidic), because the cells are starving. They can’t move glucose from the bloodstream to the mitochondria (the cell’s power plants). The acidosis signals that the body is close to death. This results in a life threatening diabetic ketoacidosis. Insulin is a fat storage hormone. That is why Type 1 diabetics who are not yet on insulin are usually very thin. Once they are treated with insulin, many become overweight and develop metainflammation.
In type 2 Diabetes, patients make too much insulin and are insulin resistant (their cells stop answering insulin). The more insulin the liver and muscle cells see, the more fat they store. As insulin resistance gets worse, some areas resist insulin even more. These include high-energy regions of the brain. The inside of those cells runs short of fuel. This is possibly the explanation of Alzheimer’s, often called Type 3 Diabetes, or diabetes of the brain. All the while, high insulin levels keep piling on fat and keep blood glucose high. Adding more insulin to this metabolic fire only makes the fire worse.
The symptom of Type 2 Diabetes is high glucose, but the real problem of Type 2 Diabetes is high insulin. Adding more insulin to a body that already has high insulin is the current standard of care. The lip service paid to lifestyle change is dishonest. Why? The same dietary guidelines push eating 5-6 times per day. That keeps insulin receptors from getting sensitive again. Most of the industry-sponsored education is also paid for by the companies that make recurring revenue from this chronic metabolic dysfunction.
In fact, studies now show that using more insulin results in more side effects and more body weight. That fits the fact that insulin causes fat to build up in storage.
About 10,000 years ago, humans changed from a traveling hunter-gatherer culture to a settled farming culture. As a result, carb-rich foods (wheat, rice, corn, potatoes) became staples. That helped regional human populations grow. Relying on carbohydrates as the main fuel was associated with a drop in height, bone mass, muscle mass, and lifespan at the same time.
Just in the last 100 years, we saw a dramatic rise in type 2 Diabetes with the arrival of industrial seed oils. The rise sped up significantly in the last 30 years. That timing lines up with a government policy shift that told people to cut saturated fats. This cultural brainwash pushed a “low-fat” diet, which replaced traditional fats with carbohydrates. On top of that, industry-paid and manipulated research data promoted Omega-6 seed oil as “heart healthy.”
Oxidative stress and inflammation happen because insulin drives glucose into the liver and fat cells. It pushes past the point where the mitochondria can use the incoming fuel. The cell can’t handle the heavy load of glucose. The surplus of inflammatory omega 6 fatty acids sets off an inflammatory cascade. At the same time, a nonenzymatic glycation process (sugar sticking to proteins) makes the cell wall stiff, and working surface receptors are lost. The cell becomes resistant to insulin. Extra insulin from outside only makes more insulin resistance and stores more fat in the liver.
Excess carbohydrates trigger Type 2 Diabetes. But the defect is kept going by the inflammatory state associated with omega 6 fatty acids from industrial seed oils. Insulin resistance spirals out of control. It acts as a positive feedback loop instead of a negative feedback loop, and it only makes the oxidative stress worse. Insulin is like adding gas to a gas fire.
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Medically reviewed by Dr. Gurpreet Singh Padda, MD, MBA, MHP
Interventional pain physician, addiction medicine specialist and obesity medicine diplomate.
Licensed in Missouri and Illinois.
Last reviewed June 17, 2026
