Alzheimer's cases may quadruple by 2050

[Maddy McCall]

Source: AP

WASHINGTON (AP) -- More than 26 million people worldwide have Alzheimer's disease, and a new forecast says the number will quadruple by 2050. At that rate, one in 85 people will have the brain-destroying disease in 40 years, researchers from Johns Hopkins University conclude.

snip/

"If we can make even modest advances in preventing Alzheimer's disease, or delay its progression, we could have a huge global public health impact," said Johns Hopkins public health specialist Ron Brookmeyer, who led the new study.

The biggest jump is projected for densely populated Asia, home of almost half of today's Alzheimer's cases, 12.6 million. By 2050, Asia will have 62.8 million of the world's 106 million Alzheimer's patients, the study projects.

A recent U.S. study estimated that this nation's Alzheimer's toll will reach 16 million by 2050, compared with more than 5 million today. The new estimate is significantly lower, suggesting only 3.1 million North American cases today and 8.8 million by 2050.



Read more: http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/A/ALZHEIMERS_RISE?SITE=MSJAD&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

[lse7581011]

1. My Dad Has It!

It's a devastating disease! God knows I hope they can help future patients!

[Maddy McCall]

2. I agree.

I'm not well read on this topic, but am I correct to understand that stem cell research could hold the answer that millions of alzheimer patients are looking for?

[lse7581011]

3. Yes!

You are correct. Although I am definitely not a Nancy Regan fan she is right on this issue. It's a long, slow goodbye and stem cell research is defnitely promising!

[Karenina]

4. Early PR cover for

MAD COW.

[dEMOK]

6. You could be right...

Mad Cow Disease and Alzheimer's — Is there a connection?

Biochemist Colm Kelleher speculates that the infectious "prion" proteins that cause Mad Cow Disease and its brain-wasting human variant, Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD), could be a factor in the substantial increase in cases of Alzheimer's disease in recent years. His book Brain Trust (2006) is a medical detective story that traces the origin and spread of the deadly infectious prions that cause Mad Cow disease as they jumped species and ended up in America's food supply. It also shows how human Mad Cow disease is hidden in the current epidemic of Alzheimer's Disease...

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/youropinions.php?opinionid=11677

[NYC]

13. Yes, I'm wondering if that's what it is.

Why not?

[Kali]

14. BSE and the possibly related human diseases CJD and vCJD are NOT

the same as Alzheimer's.

Although it is possible some cases of CJD may have been misdiagnosed as Alzheimer's.

[CHIMO]

15. Dying for a Hamburger

Dying for a Hamburger
Modern Meat Processing and the Epidemic of Alzheimer's Disease
Murray Waldman, M.D., and Marjorie Lamb

They present startling evidence that Alzheimer's may be part of a family of diseases linked to malformed proteins known as prions. They hypothesize that the conditions that allow these brain disorders to be triggered are similar. They propose that mad cow, its human equivalent, Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD), other encephalitic diseases, and Alzheimer's may have a common antecedent.

http://www.holtzbrinckpublishers.com/academic/book/BookDisplay.asp?BookKey=2233585

A very thorough book on our meat processing industry with a link to our modern day illness called Alzheimer's disease.

[okoboji]

17. Boston Legal ....

Denny Crane, tells everyone that he has Mad Cow, even though he really has Alzheimer's.

[movonne]

5. There must be something in the air...or food...

[Maddy McCall]

7. I seem to recall that aluminum cookware...

contributes to Alzheimers. I can't recall if that's been proved or not, though.

I wish that this disease could be eradicated. It's terrible to watch the progression of this disease.

:(

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

8. Interestingly enough, there seems to be a correlation

between eating tumeric and not getting Alzheimer's. In India, where tumeric is a common ingredient in curry, the rate of Alzheimer's is less than in countries where it is not eaten as much. It seems that it is the curcumn in tumeric that does the trick. They are doing interesting studies about it now. Some articles include:

http://www.montefin.com/diet/health/spices/curry-turmeric-curcumin-alzheimers.html

http://blogs.orlandosentinel.com/features_healthblog/2006/11/curry_may_prote.html

http://blogs.orlandosentinel.com/features_healthblog/2006/11/curry_may_prote.html

Curry, anyone? I'll be glad to make some--yum!

[Maddy McCall]

9. They don't eat red meat either, do they?

Hindus, I mean.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

10. Most Hindus don't eat meat at all

but Muslims do, and make delicious curry, especially of chicken. I had the honor of cooking chicken curry for an Indian Pir who was visiting the US in 1990. He was a wonderful person in his 80s at the time, I believe, and yet very young at heart.

[JTFrog]

11. Time to legalize marijuana then.

New research shows that marijuana may help reverse Alzheimer's.

[okoboji]

16. or start building

vasts amounts of institutions to house all these people with Alzheimer's/Mad cow .....

[WePurrsevere]

12. Until his death we were caregivers for my DH's father who had both it & MID & now

my beloved (step) mom has been recently Dx'd with "probably" having Alzheimer's. Needless to say we have a heightened interest in this horrible disease and it's treatments. Being caregiver's 24/7/365 as we were is not something we want to deal with or even worse (in our opinion) have our children/grandchildren deal with. :(

Anyway, although this is really frightening bad news there is some very promising good news to give us hope (and some of us really need to hold on tight to that). I ran across this in AARP's recent newsletter: http://www.aarp.org/bulletin/yourhealth/alzheimer.html

This month, scientists are expected to announce final test results for the first in a whole new generation of drugs designed to attack the underlying cause of Alzheimer's disease—medicines that offer what one expert calls "genuine, tangible, quantifiable hope" for those with mild to moderate forms of the illness.

"Within three years, it's all but certain we'll have disease-modifying drugs that fundamentally change the nature of Alzheimer's," says Sam Gandy, M.D., chair of the National Medical and Scientific Advisory Council of the Alzheimer's Association and director of the Farber Institute for Neurosciences in Philadelphia.

<snip>
This next generation of drugs is designed to prevent, destroy and clean out deposits of beta-amyloid plaque that kill the brain's nerve cells, leading to the devastating loss of memory, reason and, ultimately, life that characterizes Alzheimer's.

Researchers have repeatedly shown that when plaque is reduced in the brains of mice with Alzheimer's, the mice can solve problems and run mazes that once confounded them. And early test results for some of the new anti-amyloid drugs show they've helped Alzheimer's patients remain stable and even improve for several years.

There's another article along similar lines that I know I saw recently but I haven't found it yet. If I do I'll post it. :)

Hopefully a cure and preventive method will make this frighting news moot very soon. Sadly it may not be in time for all of those who have it now... but maybe it will be for some and for the future... God/dess but I truly hope so. This is a horrible disease I wouldn't wish on anyone or their loved ones.

[Xenotime]

18. Thank you fuckin *. We need this administration out in 2008...

so these issues can be more important than some illegal war.

[driver8]

19. I told my wife that if I ever develop Alzheimer's...give me a bottle of

sleeping pills and a big glass of vodka, tuck me, turn out the light...hasta la vista, baby!

I watched my grandmother live for 7 years with this disease -- fuck that. I don't want to live that way.

[Kool Kitty]

20. I couldn't agree with you more.

My sister and I have what we jokingly call the "pilow over the face" pact. Our Mother died of Alzheimer's and neither one of us want to go that way. A long, slow, sad horror. Our Mother was diagnosed with it in 1990, and she died in 2001.