CHeBA Lobbies Prime Minister to Place Dementia on G20 Agenda

On the back of the success of the recent G8, the the Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing (CHeBA) is lobbying Prime Minister Tony Abbott to to place dementia prominently on the G20 agenda, when it is held in November.
CHeBA co-director Professor Henry Brodaty says: "This is a unique opportunity to meet the challenge of dementia. "It could be another 20 years before Australia again assumes presidency of G20. That will be too late.   This is our future and our children’s future and their children’s future."
Fellow co-director Professor Perminder Sachdev continued: "Dementia featured prominently at the recent G8 forum; we wish to carry the momentum forward as its impact on G20 countries like China, India and Brazil is even greater and growing rapidly.
"If dementia care were a country, it would be the world’s 18th largest economy. If it were a company, it would be the world’s largest by annual revenue exceeding Wal-Mart (US$414 billion) and Exxon Mobil (US$311 billion)," he added.
The number of people with dementia is expected to double by 2030 and triple by 2050. The costs of caring for people with dementia are likely to  rise even faster than the prevalence. "Reports from individual countries such as the UK suggest that dementia is one of the costliest illnesses – and yet research and investment is at a far lower level than for other major illnesses," Mr Sachdev said.
In its petition, CHeBA said "at the recent G8 summit, the leading economies of the world made a commitment to developing a cure for dementia by 2025. The UK said it would double its annual research funding for dementia to £132m by 2025. The USA has increased its funding for dementia recently by 12.5%. However, all this comes from a low base, with research funding for cancer currently being about 8 times, and for cardiovascular disease about 6 times that for dementia in high income countries (HICs). A huge imbalance will continue to exist."
"Greater research funding will help develop new treatments, but more importantly, exploit the current knowledge to develop strategies to prevent dementia or delay its onset. "The G8 has set ambitious targets. We ask Mr Abbott to take the lead and make it a truly global fight against the dementia time bomb."
Please click here to sign the petition.