Toronto went under a blanket of snow in November of 1921, as usual. With the holidays around, it was difficult to find a doctor for Leonard.
Leonard had been ill awhile. His breathing filled his room with the smell of fruits. Florence was running up and down the stairs. Harry was about to bring the doctor.
Florence had nothing in mind other than prayer and fear. Kneeling by Leonard’s bed she was murmuring, “God, please don’t take Leonard from us.”
Earlier in the week, Leonard was calling Cecil now and then. He used to be a perfect big brother to Cecil. Cecil was five years younger than him.
Harry went to serve his country in the front during the war. Then Cecil just started walking. Two years later, Harry learned by a letter from Florence that the toddler he left at home was no more. Each word in that letter was soaked in teardrops of a heartbroken mother. It was five years ago.
Few weeks ago, Leonard was frequenting the bathroom. Harry scolded him, “Can’t you finish your work before going to the bathroom?”
Florence smiled and protested, “He’s only fourteen, leave him.”
Then she added, “He’s now too hungry. He always asks for extra cheese and salami after breakfast… even after meals.”
Meanwhile, Florence was worried when Leonard started complaining about a disgruntled bowel. Yet, she did not lose her patience, until Leonard started getting confused about his whereabouts and losing the sense of days and nights. It was the time when Florence first confided in Harry about Leonard’s condition.
Harry thought of consulting doctors after Thanksgiving. But his fear of losing Leonard drove him to find a doctor right away. The trauma of losing Cecil was still gnawing at him.
The doctor tested Leonard’s blood sugar. It was alarmingly high. Then the doctor put Leonard on a diet. It did not lower Leonard’s blood sugar. Within days, he started losing weight drastically.
Few miles away from the anxious home of Harry J and Florence Thompson, scientists at the University of Toronto hit a roadblock in their research. Dr. John James Rickard Macleod declared, “No more surgical removal of dog pancreases in my lab.”
Charles Best, the expert in blood sugar measurement, was disappointed, “That ends our experiment. The success we’ve seen so far would go nowhere.”
Principal researcher Dr. Frederick Grant Banting suggested, “I’m going tomorrow to the nearest William Davies slaughterhouse.”
Dr. Macleod asked, “Would insulin from beef and pork work as good as that from dogs?”
Dr. Banting did not come this far to accept further human death due to Type One diabetes. A year ago, he had read about creation of insulin in the cells comprising islets of Langerhans, within the pancreas. He also noted their slower decay compared to surrounding pancreas. Since then, he was confident about curing diabetes by insulin injections. He only needed to further an experiment he had read about to extract insulin. Insulin injections revitalized diabetic dogs at Dr. Macleod’s lab . Those dogs got diabetes after their pancreases were removed surgically.
Dr. Banting assured, “Provenance of insulin doesn’t matter. Only concentration matters. Concentration varies from species to species. We need to find appropriate concentration for our test dogs and then for the humans.”
Dr. Macleod proposed, “I’ll bring James Collip. He’s a biochemist. He’d purify canine and cattle insulin to get insulin of different concentrations.”
A month passed. Collip purified cattle insulin and administered them on the test dogs. Best found that the cattle insulin was working fine on diabetic test dogs.
The team of four was eagerly waiting to try their methods about insulin injections on diabetic humans. It was the most important and the ultimate step in the experiment. Their colleagues at all the hospitals in Toronto were aware of their needs.
Around this time, Thompsons were reeling under bereavement of their child, Cecil, and was worrying about the health of the firstborn, Leonard. The horror for Harry and Florence heightened one afternoon.
Leonard went to the bathroom. He was taking longer than usual. Florence started knocking on the bathroom door and asking, “Leonard, are you alright?”
Leonard responded a few times. Then he stopped.
Florence called Harry. Harry asked a few times, “Son, come out, your mother’s worried.”
There was no response from Leonard.
Then Harry announced, “I’m coming in, Son.”
He forced open the bathroom door. They found Leonard lying on the floor, soiled in feces, soaked in urine.
Florence started cleaning Leonard then and there. Harry rushed to Leonard’s room and brought clean clothes from the dresser. They together changed their boy.
Then Harry picked Leonard’s head up and Florence took the feet. The parents carried their son to his bed.
Since then, Leonard came to senses intermittently, only to talk deliriously. Sometimes, he was talking to his playmates, sometimes to the boys in the school, gradually sinking deeper down in an unfathomable realm of unconsciousness. The doctor asked Harry, “Try a hospital, now.”
Toronto General Hospital contacted Dr. Macleod’s lab for Leonard. Yet, Banting and the team were hesitant. They doubted if the Thompsons would allow them to treat Leonard with insulin extracted from animals.
Florence told them, “Leonard’s all that we have. Please, save him.”
Harry emphasized, “We’re ready to go at any length to save his life.”
Collip injected canine insulin on January 11, 1922, into Leonard and said, “Congratulations. You’re the first human to receive external insulin.”
Becoming history appeared painful. Leonard’s needle puncture grew into an abscess. His ketone levels shot high. His blood sugar level lowered, though.
Collip went back to the anvil. He burned the midnight oil. After twelve days of toil, he purified canine insulin further. It saved Leonard’s life.
In 1922, Banting and Macleod gave away the patents for commercial production of insulin from beef and pork. Countless lives have been saved from Type One diabetes, since then, a hundred years ago.
Following year, Banting and Macleod were awarded the Nobel Prize for Medicine or Physiology.
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