Help us fight the heartbreak of dementia
Mother, 31, with 50/50 chance of Alzheimer’s begs new PM to triple research budget
A YOUNG mother who has a 50/50 chance of developing Alzheimer’s in her 40s has pleaded with Boris Johnson to boost funding for dementia research.
Carli Pirie, 31, has a genetic fault which puts her at high risk of getting the disease while she is young.
Her mother, grandmother and greatgrandfather all developed early-onset Alzheimer’s – and Miss Pirie is terrified her 11-year-old daughter, Olivia, may also fall victim. Writing yesterday to the Prime Minister, she said: ‘I need to know that everything possible is being done to protect the future for my daughter and the rest of her generation to end the heartbreak that dementia causes. I am asking you in your new role as Prime Minister to make a commitment to increase funding for dementia research and help find the treatments we so desperately need.’
Miss Pirie, whose mother Tracey is already in a care home with advanced Alzheimer’s at 58, urged Mr Johnson to triple dementia research spending to bring it broadly in line with the figure spent on cancer.
She also backed the Daily Mail’s dementia care campaign, which is calling for an urgent solution to the social care crisis. More than 200,000 people have signed the Mail’s petition demanding an end to the scandal in which countless people have to sell their homes to pay for their care. Miss Pirie said: ‘We have been to hell and back sorting out my mother’s care. Families have to jump through so many hoops just to get the right level of care. You are already having to cope with so much as it is, you shouldn’t have to deal with this as well. My mother is now in a good place with her care but I was shocked at how hard it was to arrange.’
Some 850,000 people in the UK have dementia – of which 500,000 have Alzheimer’s. Miss Pirie, of Biggleswade, Bedfordshire, who works for a heating company, has a 50 per cent chance of developing Alzheimer’s in the next two decades.
‘I do not want my daughter to have to jump through the same hoops I have had to if I need the same care,’ she said.
Miss Pirie does not know yet if she carries the rare genetic fault which significantly raises the risk of early-onset Alzheimer’s. If she does, then Olivia will have a 50/50 chance of carrying the gene too. ‘It’s genetic pot luck,’ Miss Pirie said.
The Government spends £83million on dementia research a year – against £270million for cancer. The Department of Health said: ‘We have committed to spend at least £60million a year on dementia research and last year spent more than £80million to accelerate progress in early detection, improved treatment, prevention and care.’