Dementia has quickly become a serious illness, and it is alarming. It is now one of the most important health issues worldwide. In the United Kingdom alone, about 850,000 people who have dementia. Because of this, research charity organization, Alzheimer's Research U.K. encourages all political parties to participate in finding life-changing treatments for dementia.
NOT AN INEVITABLE ILLNESS
According to the United Kingdom's National Health Service, dementia is an umbrella term for all conditions characterized by a decline in memory, language, problem-solving skills, and general thinking skills that enables people to perform everyday activities. The most common occurrence of dementia is memory loss, and the most known cause would be Alzheimer's disease.
Although dementia is known to affect older people (especially people about 65 years old), some cases of the disease can develop earlier, often exhibiting different issues for the affected person. With this case in mind, Alzheimer's Research U.K. calls on U.K.'s political parties to be united to fight this disease by having them commit at least 1% of the national funding to research about dementia.
According to Alzheimer's Research U.K., one in three people born will eventually develop dementia during their lifetime unless, of course, if new treatments and preventions are going to be discovered. The funding for research in dementia still lags behind other health areas, according to the research charity and primarily the reason why they are demanding a bigger investment. As of recent years, the U.K. government spends 82.5 million pounds a year on dementia research.
The research charity made the demands after the Labor party announced its plan of action for the National Health Service. The party's plan for the NHS includes investing 1 billion pounds in public health that will be focusing on prevention. This proves to be a good opportunity since previous research shows that dementia can actually be prevented through positive lifestyle changes.
In a statement made by Alzheimer's Research UK, Samantha Benham-Hermetz, director of policy and public affairs said: "Dementia is crippling our society, our economy, and our NHS and it will continue to do so unless we bring about life-changing treatments. That's why Alzheimer's Research U.K. is calling on all political parties to face up to the dementia challenge during this general election campaign and commit to making much greater investments in dementia research." According to the research charity's statement, the Labor Party's pledge to commit bigger funding towards health services is promising and definitely encouraging, and bigger changes can be made if there are efforts in educating the public about brain health. Bernham-Hermetz explained that public information can go a long way as people will be aware of what to avoid and actively make healthy lifestyle choices to prevent dementia.