Oct. 3, 2008

MEMPHIS, Tenn. - - The University of Memphis women's basketball team will assist the organizers of the Wipe Out Diabetes Walk, Saturday, at Shelby Farms. The Tigers will greet teams and walkers from 8:00-9:00 and will assist in the Kids Zone from 9:00-12:00.

The walk is being organized by the West Tennessee chapter of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation International. The Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation International is the leading charitable funder and advocate of type 1 (juvenile) diabetes research worldwide. Since its founding in 1970 by parents of children with type 1 diabetes, JDRF has awarded more than $1.16 billion to diabetes research. More than 24 million Americans have diabetes (8 percent of the population), and as many as three million Americans may have type 1 diabetes.

According to www.jdrf.org, diabetes currently affects 246 million people worldwide and is expected to affect 380 million by 2025. In the U.S., a new case of diabetes is diagnosed every 30 seconds. The single-most costly chronic disease, diabetes accounted for $174 billion in health-care costs in the U.S. alone in 2007, meaning one in every five health-care dollars in the U.S. is spent caring for someone diagnosed with diabetes. Diabetes causes a variety of complications and is the leading cause of kidney failure, adult blindness, and non-traumatic amputations and is a leading cause of nerve damage, stroke and heart attacks. The disease kills one American every three minutes and is the sixth-leading cause of death reported in the U.S.

The walk will be held around Patriot Lake at Shelby Farms, located just off of Walnut Grove.