Tistics on dementia anning ahead will – MP Mario Galea

rapidly. This puts a much greater demand on government services, which highlights the importance of up-to-date statistics.”

According to the World Alzheimer Report, said Galea, there are currently over 50 million people suffering from dementia globally. “This number will increase to 74.7 million by 2030 and 131.5 million by 2050. Each year, 10 million people are diagnosed with dementia around the world, which means that one case of dementia is diagnosed in every three seconds. The current global cost of dementia stands at one trillion US dollars annually. This means that if dementia was a country, it would be the 18th largest economy in the world and would exceed the market value of Apple and Google,” he said.

Galea stressed the fact that experts say dementia is a pandemic that is looming on the horizon. “We have to be prepared for it, otherwise its effects will be devastating.”

He added that dementia is different from Alzheimer’s, and that all those with Alzheimer’s have dementia – which is memory impairment – but not all those with dementia have Alzheimer’s.

“It has to be said that, to date, there is no cure for dementia but only drugs which delay the progress of dementia.” He said that under the PN government such drugs began to be given freely to dementia patients.

“Dementia is essentially a mental health condition and, regretfully, like other patients suffering with mental health conditions, people with dementia are usually stigmatised. I trust that through the books [informative books handed out under the PN administration] we published we made more families aware of the reality of dementia.”

Galea went on to speak about the many measures the PN had taken to care for dementia patients.