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Christopher Barbara
27years
CC
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“Diabetes No Limits”
This is the tagline Christopher lives with as a type 1 Diabetic. Diagnosed at the age of 11 years, his life didn’t stop by this life change.
Together with the support of his family and that of the impeccable support of the Diabetes Clinic together with the Maltese Diabetes Association, Christopher always fought and will continue to fight life in order to live it as healthy as possible.
At the age of 16 he started one of his dreams that of helping other people with the same condition especially youth to fight social problems that a person with Diabetes might have by educational sessions through his experience and knowledge gained. From that on he never stopped. 4 years ago together with Ms. Therese Piscopo has started a new project for youth with the name of DAISY (Diabetes Association In Support of Youth) were Christopher is the Coordinator of this sub-group of the Maltese Diabetes Association.
Christopher always loves to take challenges especially when he knows that from them he could learn new things in order to improve his life style. He takes part in several projects regarding Diabetes such as camps and seminars both nationally and away. On an international level he went to Cyprus to take part in a Diabetes Summer Camp, the annual general seminar of IDF International Diabetes Federation in Ireland and Serbia where he also took part in an intensive Diabetes Summer Camp. Together with the Diabetes Association of Pancevo he is with direct communication with the organizers to start introducing DAISY there as well.
Christopher is a very adventurous guy in fact his hobbies are extreme sports such as Diving where he has the first license that of an ‘Open Water Diver’ he also do abseiling and in his pipe-line he has another ambition that of mountain climbing.
During his work experience he also never stops by taking new challenges, till now he worked as a security at the Malta International Airport, worked at Lufthansa Technik Logistiks Services in Malta where here he also had to travel alone in order to get special exams for him to continue doing this kind of job that of Shipping. Today he says that his present job opened him a lot of ways to express his ideas to original designs in promotions, he occupies the role of a CNC programmer.
During his free time he loves to paint and take part in reenactments.
Well we all can say that he has a very fully loaded life but although he has Diabetes he live a normal healthy life as it should be after all.
Andrew
Zammit McKeon
23 years
Jonathan, 17
San Francisco
Matthew Thomas Carbonaro
21 years
Andrew Zammit McKeon was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes at age 8. He participated in the first summer camp for children with diabetes and has been attending ever since, first as a participant and now as a helper.
He has played an active part in the Maltese Diabetes Association and represented the association/IDF Europe in a number of conferences namely EPF (European Patients Forum). He also attended the summer camp for European youths organized by IDF Europe in Slovenia. He will be representing Malta in the Youth Leader's Program in Melbourne during December 2013.
Andrew is 23 years and just graduated as engineer.
Live life to the full. That is the phrase he always try to follow, and having type 1 diabetes doesn't stop him from doing all the things he love which include all sorts of things from physical activities such as football to more intellectual interests such as music and philosophy.
He's been diagnosed with type 1 diabetes since 14 years now and although it's not always easy to have a healthy controlled lifestyle he somehow managed to fit everything he want to do whilst also taking care of his condition as much as possible. His job in the DAISY group is to help promote awareness on type 1 diabetes by educating and showing people, especially youth, how to live a so-called 'normal life' without neglecting their condition. He strongly believes that having a healthy controlled lifestyle means having a healthy mental, biological and social life.