With dementia threatening to drain Medicare and Medicaid funds, the Obama administration is crafting a National Alzheimer’s Plan, according to the Associated Press.
http://healthland.time.com/2011/09/14/u-s-prepares-a-national-plan-for-alzheimers/
The aim is to create a strategy that will “combine research aimed at fighting he mind-destroying disease with help that caregivers need to stay afloat,” AP reported Tuesday.
Dementia, Alzheimer’s disease included, is the bane of Baby Boomers. Some are saddled with the duty of dealing with, emotionally and financially, the burden of caring for elderly parents stricken with dementia. And secondly, boomers face the frightening prospect of developing Alzheimer’s disease themselves, a malady that has no cure yet.
There are 5.4 million American’s with either Alzheimer’s or another form of dementia, and it is the sixth-leading killer, according to AP. And that’s nothing compared to the future of Baby Boomers. It’s estimated that by 2050 13 million to 16 million Americans will have Alzheimer’s, and that they will generate $1 trillion in medical and nursing-home costs, AP said.
Caregivers, who often go broke paying for care for loved ones with dementia, are clamoring for a national game plan on the matter. And they are asking some hard questions, like why the National Institutes of Health are shelling out roughly six times more for research on AIDS than on Alzheimer’s.
Why indeed?