Falling asleep at the end of a long winter day may seem as natural as breathing.

For one Whitehorse resident, however, succumbing to the land of dreams is a nightly worry.

'Going to sleep at night, I always worry if I'm going to wake up in the morning, because you just don't know,' said Araica McPhee, who has type one diabetes.

'If I have a severe low blood sugar in the middle of the night, I could go into a coma in the middle of the night and just not know.'

Diagnosed with the disease in her early twenties, McPhee said that for the first year, her sister had to phone her every morning at 7:00.

'If I didn't answer�- she had to run down the street and open my door and make sure I was awake.

'It's a hell of a thing to go to sleep with,' she said in an interview last week.

McPhee, 31, has type one diabetes. This means her body produces little or no insulin, a hormone which is needed to store and use the sugars the body uses for energy. There is no known cause for type one diabetes.

Type two diabetes occurs when the body does not produce enough insulin or when it does not properly use insulin. This is the strain of diabetes that has been widely publicized in recent years for being linked to childhood obesity.

Of the two million Canadians with diabetes, approximately 90 per cent have type two while about 10 per cent have type one, according to the Canadian Diabetes Association (CDA).

They expect the number to rise to three million by 2010.

In the midst of the lead-in to a national election, the association is calling for a national drug plan for all Canadians suffering from chronic diseases, including diabetes.

The organization is proposing that those with chronic diseases pay no more than three per cent of their annual income on the caring for their illness.

This proposed catastrophic drug plan would include coverage of 'drugs, supplies and devices,' according to a release from the association last week.

A monthly arsenal of medications and supplies would run McPhee about $700 to $800 per month if she had to pay out-of-pocket.

This cost includes supplies like insulin, test strips and her insulin pump.

Being in the Yukon, however, makes living with the disease affordable, she said.

The territory already has a chronic care plan brought in by an NDP government in the late 1980s.

The plan covers people living with long-term diseases and serious functional disabilities, noted Pat Living, the communications officer for the Department of Health and Social Services.

'That is defined as a health condition or a disease that is marked by a long duration or frequent recurrence,' she said.

There are approximately 70 conditions covered under the territory's plan, ranging from HIV/AIDS to muscle paralysis to epilepsy to diabetes.

Items covered under the plan include prescription drugs, medical and surgical supplies, medical equipment, food supplements and prothesis that are medically required, she said.

There are 1,165 people in the territory using the plan, Living said this week.

In the territory, a Yukoner pays the first $250 worth of drugs and supplies each year. After that, whatever amount is not covered by work insurance plans is covered by the government, Living explained.

Because of the territory's chronic care plan, a nationwide catastrophic drug plan isn't as essential in the Yukon as it is in other parts of the country, McPhee said.

'Living here, it probably wouldn't make a large difference. Because we are so lucky to have chronic care,' she said.

'Since I've lived here, I don't really notice the financial impact.'

The Yukon, however, is a leader in the country for financial assistance to those with diabetes, according to the CDA.

The amount of coverage a person gets varies vastly across the country.

While the Yukon falls second only to Nunavut for the highest amount of coverage in Canada, the provinces in eastern Canada rank among the lowest for coverage.

A person with no insurance living in Newfoundland and Labrador with type one diabetes, for example, could spend 25 per cent of their annual income on drugs and supplies, according to the CDA.

A person living in Whitehorse with the same income, however, would spend only about 1.7 per cent of her or his yearly wages.

Treating the disease properly in the short term also saves health care costs in the long term, according to McPhee.

Complications from the disease range from loss of eyesight to kidney and nerve damage to loss of limbs, she said.

'My grandfather lost both his legs because of his diabetes,' she said. 'He didn't take care of himself the way he should have, but a lot of older people don't.'

McPhee's main concern in the Yukon is to educate those living with type one and type two diabetes about the disease.

It is important to teach people how to care for themselves properly, she said.

'In the Yukon, we have everything from six-month-old babies to seniors, all living with variations of the disease.

'Up here, more than anything, it's awareness.'