'Human' insulin versus animal insulin in people with diabetes mellitus

Human insulin has become the insulin of choice for newly diagnosed patients with diabetes mellitus. Insulin companies are eventually not going to maintain different species formulations for a declining proportion of the population with diabetes using animal insulin. Concerns exist about increased hypoglycaemia following transfer to human insulin and availability of animal insulin especially in developing countries. In our systematic review we could not identify substantial differences in the safety and efficacy between insulin species. Many important patient-oriented outcomes like health-related quality of life and effects on diabetic complications and mortality were never investigated. Human insulin was introduced into the market without scientific proof of advantage over existing purified animal insulins, especially porcine insulin.