Mary Jackson,

Zinc is a very valuable mineral.  It's one of many minerals, like chromium
and vanadium, that are lost through soil depletion and are important for
diabetics.

I assume from your post, that your child has Type I diabetes.  Was your child
born without islets cells in the pancreas, or did this develope during
childhood?  I'm unaware of any correlation between zinc defiency and
destruction of the islets cells, but it's worth investigating.  Is your child
allergic to milk?

Atkins has reported in his newsletter about studies linking milk consumption
to Type I diabetes.  If you're interested, I can give you more details of the
autoimmune mechanism in a later post.  It's possible that a milk intolerance
could effect the absorption of valuable minerals like zinc.

Ed Campbell, DC,CSCS