November 24, 2015

Today's Top Alzheimer's News

USA2 SPOTLIGHT 

ICYMIA November 20, 2015 Huffington Post 50 opinion piece by UsAgainstAlzheimer's co-founder Trish Vradenburg highlighted her personal connection to the Alzheimer’s fight and called on readers and policymakers to increase funding for Alzheimer’s research. According to Vradenburg, “This is a critical time in our battle. Earlier this year, a key Congressional committee recommended increasing NIH funding for Alzheimer's by $350 million in the new fiscal year. SOS: write and call your members of Congress and ask--make that demand--at least $350 million more for Alzheimer's research funding in Fiscal Year 2016. In DC numbers count! And to the caretakers - with the strength you have left, please join this effort. Today as I write, a cure for Alzheimer's is a fantasy, a wish, an impossible dream. The same words that were said to Galileo, Edison, Einstein, Salk and whoever dreamed up the internet. Yesterday's dream is today's reality. I think my mom would be proud.”

MUST READS

A November 24, 2015 The Daily Record opinion piece by Jeannie Castells underscored the need to make Alzheimer’s a national priority. According to Castells, “Seventy-six million Baby Boomers are coming into the age range for Alzheimer’s. It has no prevention, no treatment and no cure. Hospitals, nursing homes, home health care agencies, even doctor’s offices are going to be overrun with those looking for help ... and answers…As Congress gets ready to vote on the budget for Fiscal Year 2016, please take a moment and tell your representatives to vote for the proposed $300 million for Alzheimer’s research. Because Alzheimer’s is much more than a disease, it has become a national priority.” Jeannie Castells is an Alzheimer’s Ambassador for U.S. Rep. Leonard Lance

A November 24, 2015 The Buffalo News opinion piece by Robert Zirkelbach called for a focus on access to drugs versus cost. According to Zirkelbach, “It is disingenuous to focus solely on the price of medicines while ignoring the more costly services that make up the other 90 percent of health care spending, as well as the financial burden that rising copays, coinsurance and deductibles are having on patients seeking access to prescription medicines…And if a new medicine is developed that delays the onset of Alzheimer’s disease by five years, it would save $367 billion by 2050…We need to focus on pursuing proposals that improve access to medicines and foster research on new treatments and cures that will help patients live healthier, more productive lives.” Robert Zirkelbach is Senior Vice President of Communications with the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA).

A November 24, 2015 Tulsa World article profiled one father’s struggle with Alzheimer’s and his commitment to officiate his son’s wedding. According to the article, “The holiday will be a big day for traditional reasons and for a bonus reason: Jones, a minister, has been asked to preside over a Thanksgiving wedding at an Owasso home…The father/minister said it will be a privilege to perform the ceremony. ‘I’m thankful my mind is still good enough to do it,’ he said. Chuck Jones, 79, has Alzheimer’s disease. He wants to be prepared for his Thanksgiving gig, and he doesn’t want to leave anything — memory included — to chance. That’s why he carries the little green notebook, which contains scripture references and the basics of a wedding script.”

A November 23, 2015 The Washington Post article reported on the link between Spanish conquistadors and Alzheimer’s in a small Colombian town plagued by the disease. According to the article, “Locals call the disease La Bobera — “the foolishness” — and the village bears uncanny parallels with the fictional Macondo in Gabriel García Márquez’s novel “One Hundred Years of Solitude,” where people suffer memory disorders and hallucinations. While what is sometimes called Yarumal’s curse has been well known, no one has known how the mutation first appeared. Now researchers have traced the ancestry of the mutation, concluding that it was probably introduced by a Spanish conquistador early in the 17th century.Ken Kosik at the University of California at Santa Barbara led a group that collected blood samples from 102 people in Antioquia and sequenced their genomes. E280A, the mutation causing Yarumal’s form of early-onset Alzheimer’s, was found in 74 individuals.