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Tom Hanks has Type 2 diabetes.
The Captain Phillips star revealed his health problems on Monday night’s Late Show with David Letterman, explaining that he found out on a recent trip to the doctor, after more than 20 years of dealing with high blood sugar.
PHOTOS: Exclusive Portraits of ‘Captain Phillips” Tom Hanks and Barkhad Abdi
Hanks’ history of losing and gaining weight for roles may have contributed to his diagnosis, according to CBS medical contributor Holly Phillips.
“In dramatic weight gain or dramatic weight loss, the equilibrium of the body is just completely off, so that might predispose him to developing Type 2 diabetes later,” the doctor said in a report on CBS This Morning.
Type 2 diabetes is the most common form of the disease and can be managed with proper treatment. Hanks, too, noted that it’s controllable with diet.
VIDEO: Tom Hanks and Barkhad Abdi on Their Drama ‘Captain Phillips’
But the actor told Letterman that extreme weight loss to cure himself of the disease would not be possible.
“My doctor said, ‘Look, if you can weigh as much as you weighed in high school, you will essentially be completely healthy. You will not have Type 2 diabetes.’ And then I said to her, ‘Well, then, I’m gonna have Type 2 diabetes, because there is no way I can weigh as much as I did in high school.'”
Hanks told Letterman he weighed 96 pounds in high school.
Sony’s Somali-pirates drama Captain Phillips hits theaters on Friday.
Watch CBS This Morning‘s report on Hanks’ diagnosis, including his comments to Letterman, below.
the anger that goes along with it and the desperation. … You’ve got to start at 60 miles an hour.” Plus: Why did director Paul Greengrass keep his Somalian actors away from his star?”]
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