A Joyous Occasion

October 8th, 1982. On this historic day, the first vial of biosynthetic human insulin was handed over to the Diabetes Vereniging Nederland (Dutch Diabetes Association). Biosynthetic human insulin is the first product manufactured using the R-DNA technique for use in humans. Also handed over was one of the original vials of insulin manufactured in the year 1922. The day marks a 60-year involvement in treatment of Diabetes Mellitis. On behalf of Eli Lilly and Company, the handover was made by Dr. Cornelius Pettinga of Indianapolis, Indiana.

The day marked the sixty years of Eli Lilly and Co.’s involvement in the treatment of diabetes type I and II and signaled a symbolic victory for the Dutch Diabetes Association which had recently successfully negotiated with health insurers to provide the medicine as part of the standard health insurance package (1,2). Frederick Banting, who discovered insulin, said: ‘Insulin does not belong to me. It belongs to the world’. However, was this really the case?