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World Alzheimer's Day: Leaders Call for
Early Diagnosis + Aggressive Research
Alzheimer's
disease carries an annual price tag of $148
billion, not to mention the personal toll
that it takes on more than 5.3 million
patients and their families.
WASHINGTON, Sept. 17
/PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- More than 5.3
million Americans are living with
Alzheimer's, and every 71 seconds someone in
America develops the disease. Approximately
50 percent of people aged 85 and older have
Alzheimer's.
According to the Alzheimer's
Association, by mid-century someone will
develop Alzheimer's every 33 seconds and
there will be nearly a million new cases per
year.
"With the country facing
unprecedented economic challenges and a
rapidly aging baby boomer population, now is
the time to address the burgeoning
Alzheimer's crisis that triples healthcare
costs for Americans aged 65 and over," said
Harry Johns, Alzheimer's Association CEO.
Alzheimer's disease is a
neurodegenerative disorder characterized by
progressive loss of memory and cognitive
function.
It destroys brain cells,
causing problems with memory, thinking, and
behavior that are severe enough to affect
everyday life. It is the disease that causes
approximately 80 percent of all dementia.
Experts believe that early
detection of Alzheimer's disease and early
intervention with improved therapies provide
the greatest opportunities to modify or halt
disease progression.
Most current therapies for
Alzheimer's treat the symptoms associated
with it and not the disease itself.
"There is a rich, diverse
variety of treatment possibilities for
Alzheimer's that scientists are exploring,
offering great hope that drugs that may slow
or even reverse disease progression could be
on the horizon -- saving millions of dollars
in public health programs," said Ronald
Petersen, M.D., Ph.D., Alzheimer's
Association Medical Scientific Advisory
Council Chair.
On World Alzheimer's Day, we
renew our commitment to early diagnosis and
aggressive Alzheimer's research in order to
improve the health outcomes for people
living with this disease.
Dr. Robert A. Stern,
Co-Director of the Alzheimer's Disease
Clinical and Research Program at Boston
University School of Medicine, and other
local clinicians and researchers are
currently studying potential new treatments
for Alzheimer's patients that target causes
of the disease, such as amyloid plaques in
the brain.
The buildup of these plaques
is thought to cause Alzheimer's disease.
Some of these investigational drugs use
antibodies, or immune system proteins, to
dissolve the plaques.
"We are now at an exciting
new point in the science and treatment of
Alzheimer's disease. For the very first time
we are getting close to having a treatment
that actually alters the course of the
disease, thus providing incredible hope for
the millions of people afflicted with
Alzheimer's as well as their family members
and other caregivers," Stern said.
"There are too many lives,
there is too little time, and there is too
much at stake for anything less than an
aggressive plan to address the threat of
this disease," Johns said.
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