The coming neurological epidemic

Biochemist Gregory Petsko, makes a convincing argument that, in next 50 years we will see an epidemic of neurological diseases, such as Alzheimer’s disease as the as the world population ages.

Unless we use something to prevent it over the next 40 years we are facing an epidemic of neurological diseases on a global scale. This planet, earth has more than 20 percent of it’s population over the age of 65. This is the world we live in. And this is the world your chlidren will live in.

For 12,000 years, the distribution of ages in human population has looked like a pyramid, with oldest on the top. It’s already flattening out. By 2050, it starts to be a column and starts to invert. This is why it’s happening.

The average lifespans more than doubled since 1840, and it’s increasing currently at the rate of about 5 hours every day. And this why, that’s not entirely a good thing; because over the age of 65, the risk of getting Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s disease will increase eventually.

Right now those other neurological diseases for which we have no cure or prevention —

Costs about a third of the trillion dollars a year. And it will be well over a trillion dollars by 2050.

Cause:

Alzheimer’s disease starts when a protien that should be folded up properly, misfolds, into a kind of demented origami.

So approach being taken is to try to design a drugs that function like molecular scotch tape, to hold the protien into it’s proper shape. That would keep ut from forming the tangles that seem to kill large sections of brain when they do. Interestingly enough, other neurological disesaes which affects very different parts of the brain also show tangles of misfolded proteins, which suggest that the approach might be just a general one and might be used to cure other diseases, not just Alzheimer’s disease.

There’s also a connection to cancer here, people with neurological disesae have very low incidence of most cancers. And this is the reason that most people aren’t pursuing right now, but which we’re fascinated by.

Most of the important and all the creative work in this area is being funded by private philanthropies. And there’s a scope for additional private help here.

In the meanwhile we all have been waiting for all this to happen here’s what you can do for yourself

If you want to lower your risk of Parkinson’s disease caffeine is protective to some extent, and nobody knows why.

Head injuries are bad for you they lead to Parkinson’s disease.

And the Avian flu is also bad.

As fas as protecting yourself from Alzheimer’s disease, well it turns out that fish oil has the effect of reducing your risk for Alzheimer’s disease. You should also keep your blood pressure down, because the chronic high blood pressure is the biggest risk factor for Alzheimer’s disease. Its also the biggest risk factor for& glaucoma, which is just Alzheimer’s disease of the eye.

And of course, when it comes to cognitive effects, “use it or lose it” applies so you want to stay mentally stimulated.

Thankyou