Number of people with dementia growing in Pakistan, say experts

Karachi
With increase in average life expectancy in Pakistan, a higher number of the country’s elderly population suffers from dementia, a chronic or persistent disorder of the mental processes caused by brain disease which is marked by memory disorders, personality changes and impaired reasoning.
“Although no specific data of elderly people suffering from dementia is available in Pakistan, it is estimated that eight to ten percent of the people aged above 65 years suffer from chronic memory loss,” said renowned neurologist Dr Wasey Shakir during a press briefing at the Karachi Press Club (KPC).
It was organised on Friday in connection with the World Dementia Day, observed on September 21 every year.
The day is also known as World Alzheimer’s Day, when organisations across the world concentrate their efforts on raising awareness the disease which the most common form of dementia.
Flanked by other noted neurologists including Dr Shahid Mustafa, Dr Naila Shahbaz and Dr Abdul Malik, Dr Wasey Shakir said after every 68 seconds someone in the world developed Alzheimer’s disease. According to him, it was estimated that between five and seven percent of the people aged above 65 and between 10 and 15 percent of the people aged above age 75 were affected with the disease.
“Dementia’s prevalence is growing and economic and social burden is high. Alzheimer’s disease is often called a family disease, because the chronic stress of watching a loved one slowly decline affects everyone. Alzheimer’s disease is the sixth leading cause of death in the world and the only cause of death among the top 10 that cannot be prevented, cured or even slowed down,” said Dr Shakir.
The neurologists claimed that the estimated population of people above 65 years in Pakistan was more than eight million.
“In Pakistan there is no population base study on neurological diseases so dementia in Pakistan has so far been under studied,” they said. “Due to a lack of research and the cultural context, it is very difficult to get an accurate number of people suffering from the disease. However, the extrapolated prevalence of people with dementia disease in Pakistan is around 200,000.”
They claimed that by the year 2050, Pakistan will become the third most populous country of the world with an estimated population of 380 million, leaving behind United States, Indonesia, Brazil and Russia.
The estimated 36 million young people aged between 15 and 24 who currently live in Pakistan are the most that have ever lived at any other time in its history, and they will be at a risk for dementia and Alzheimer’s disease by the year 2050.
At that time, the life expectancy is expected to rise and thus the economic burden of treating patients with Alzheimer’s and other forms of dementia will increase immensely, the experts said.
“In this scenario, it is very important to start investing today in public health campaigns with programs that will increase the awareness of dementia and knowledge of neuroscience that will produce trained medical staff able to treat patients and offer assistance to their families,” they said.
Dr Shahid Mustafa said timely intervention from the government in the form of increased funding in education and health will ease the current and future cost of treating people with Alzheimer’s and other forms of dementia.
“Alzheimer's is a currently incurable, debilitating and emotionally devastating disease of the brain,” he said. “If no new medical breakthrough is made, it is projected that almost 135 million people in the world will have it by 2050 and millions of families and friends will feel its overwhelming impact.”