The number of dementia cases worldwide could almost triple in the next three decades. This is the Result of a study in the trade journal The Lancet Public Health. According to her, around 153 million people could be living with dementia in 2050 – up from 57 million in 2019.
The increase is mainly due to the growth and aging of the world population. The scientists expect a particularly high increase in the number of diseases in Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, among others, while Japan could record the lowest growth rates. For Germany, the researchers forecast an increase of 65 percent, which would be below the Western European average.
The World Health Organization (WHO) warned last year that the number of people with dementia could increase rapidly over the next ten years. One of the main reasons is the increasing life expectancy: with age, the risk of so-called noncommunicable diseases and thus also of dementia increases.
“From a public health perspective, the results of the study are generally disappointing.”
The generic term dementia describes the symptoms of a whole series of mostly progressive diseases that affect the performance of the brain – Alzheimer’s dementia is one of the most common and well-known. According to the WHO, dementia is currently the seventh leading cause of death worldwide and a leading cause of disability and the need for care in the elderly.
With regard to the four biggest dementia risk factors – smoking, obesity, high blood sugar and low education – it is more important than ever to step up preventive measures, emphasizes epidemiologist Emma Nichols of the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) at the University of Washington Lead author of the study.
The scientists admit, however, that their analysis is hampered by a lack of high quality data from some parts of the world and only four dementia risk factors are considered. In addition, the study examines all types of dementia without distinguishing between different clinical subtypes – a criticism made by the two public health researchers Michaël Schwarzinger and Carole Dufouil from the University Hospital Bordeaux in a comment to take up the study: The underlying mechanisms that cause dementia would be simplified here.
“From a public health perspective, the study’s results are generally disappointing as they suggest that the rise in dementia is unstoppable,” they write. In the “apocalyptic prognoses” advisable changes in lifestyle are not factored in. It is all the more important to provide information about the means that could delay or avoid them.