USA2 SPOTLIGHT

A February 5, 2015 Washington Post article reported that the financial impact of Alzheimer’s disease in the US could "soar to more than $1 trillion a year by 2050, with much of it borne by the federal government, unless action is taken to shift current trends" according to a new report released Thursday. The article quoted USA2 Chairman George Vradenburg extensively. According to Vradenburg, "We’re spending $200 billion a year — a quarter of Medicare — right now. How much more do you want the taxpayer to pay?…How about an innovation strategy that at least says we ought to relate our research investments to the cost of our diseases?" Also reported on by Roll Call and The Hill. 

A February 3, 2015 The News & Advance article profiled ClergyAgainstAlzheimer's founder Bishop Philip Weeks and his role as a caregiver for his wife, June. According to the article, "Since 2002, when June was first diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease, Philip has cared for her daily, the load increasing in 2009 when they learned June had Lewy body dementia, a progressive form of dementia that can cause visual hallucinations, rigid muscles and tremors."

GLOBAL 

A February 5, 2015 The Japan Times editorial highlighted the Japanese government's efforts to prepare for dementia and urged policymakers to engage patients and families. According to the editorial, "The government, which recently adopted a new strategy on measures against dementia, needs to follow through on the idea of ensuring a better quality of life for patients by heeding the wishes of sufferers and their families. The new strategy was hastily put together in about two months after Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who spoke at an international conference on the issue held in Tokyo in early November, gave the order to the government. It expands on the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry’s five-year program started in fiscal 2013, which was based on the policy adopted by the previous Democratic Party of Japan-led administration.It calls for introduction of dementia diagnosis training to enable early-stage treatment and care of the patients, as well as research and development of ways to prevent and treat the disease — with a goal of establishing a method for early diagnosis by the end of fiscal 2015 and starting clinical trials toward a cure by around 2020."

A February 4, 2015 The Globe and Mail article profiled Toronto philanthropist Lynn Posluns' commitment to women's brain health and raising awareness of dementia. According to Posluns, "I wanted our organization to push for more research to be focused on women’s brains because traditionally the scientific focus has leaned toward men. A lot of research, including on the neurodegenerative diseases, is done on male lab rats because the pesky hormones in female rats make them harder to decipher. But you just can’t discount half the population because it’s more expensive to study females than males. More research is finding that there are major differences – in much the same way they recognized 20 years ago that a man’s heart attack is different than a woman’s."

RESEARCH, SCIENCE, AND TECHNOLOGY 

A February 5, 2015 San Antonio Business Journal article reported that "The Robert J. Kleberg Jr. and Helen C. Kleberg Foundation is contributing $2 million to the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio in support of additional research on Alzheimer's." According to the article, "The gift will fund a five-year grant and research led by Martin Paukert, assistant professor of physiology in the School of Medicine at the Health Science Center. Paukert and his team are studying activities in the brain that may take place long before Alzheimer's disease symptoms are observed."

A February 4, 2015 UT San Diego article reported that "Alzheimer's patients have brains with significantly more genetic variation than normal brains, including extra copies of a gene linked to the disease, according to a study led by scientists at The Scripps Research Institute." According to the article, "The finding may help scientists track down the mechanism that causes nearly all cases of Alzheimer's, a mechanism that is not well understood. And with a better understanding of the mechanism, a treatment for Alzheimer's might be developed, the scientists say. A study led by TSRI professor Jerold Chun found that neurons in brains of Alzheimer's patients had significantly more copies of fragments from chromosome 21, but not more whole chromosomes."

A February 4, 2015 ABC News article reported on research into the neurological differences of "SuperAgers." According to the article, "To understand how SuperAgers managed to keep their mental ability intact, researchers performed a battery of tests on them, including MRI scans on 12 SuperAgers and post-mortem studies on five other SuperAgers to understand the make-up of their brains…For one thing, a part of SuperAgers brains called the anterior cingulate cortex, associated with the ability to focus attention, was much thicker in SuperAgers, surpassing not only their elderly peers but younger subjects, according to the study…Geula said more studies will need to be done to confirm the initial findings of the study, but that they give direction to how scientists can approach studying memory decline. “[The results] give directions on what future studies will be done to help normal elderly and even Alzheimer patients to not lose cognitive function as much as we do,” he said.”