Aspirin could treat diabetes, researchers say

The Joslin study is a major milestone in understanding why being overweight can lead to a host of health problems, including type 2 diabetes and heart disease.

Researchers discovered that the ‘master switch’ for low-grade inflammation, which hampers the body’s ability to use insulin, is activated in the liver by weight gain. They also found that this ‘master switch’ can be turned off by salicylates, a class of drugs that includes aspirin.

“We previously knew that in obesity, the liver becomes fatty and that it accumulates fat faster than other organs and tissues,” said principal investigator Dr Steven Shoelson, Helen and Morton Adler chair and head of the section on cellular and molecular physiology at Joslin, and professor of medicine at Harvard Medicine School.

“But until now, we didn’t know fat in the liver could orchestrate the entire inflammatory process that results in insulin resistance, both locally and throughout the body,” he noted.

The researchers were inspired by previous clinical studies of human patients at Joslin, driving them to seek answers in the laboratory. Those studies had shown that overweight people who have insulin resistance had slightly higher activity levels of a factor called NF-kB and other substances normally found in inflammation.

Commenting on the salicylates discovery, Shoelson said, “These drugs – among the safest drugs known – can do a surprisingly good job of toning down this inflammation…but more studies need to be done before we can make recommendations to patients.”