Date:
August 6, 2015
Source:
Bournemouth University
Summary:
Modern living could be
responsible for an 'almost epidemic' increase in neurological brain disease.
Modern living could
be responsible for an 'almost epidemic' increase in neurological brain disease,
according to new research from Bournemouth University.
Published in the journal Surgical
Neurology International the study compared 21 Western countries between
1989 and 2010 and found that dementias are starting a decade earlier than they
used to in adults.
Furthermore deaths caused
by neurological disease have risen significantly in adults aged 55-74, and for
adults 75+ the rate has virtually doubled in every Western country in just the
last 20 years.
In the US, the problem is
particularly acute; neurological deaths in male over 75s have nearly trebled
and females rose more than five-fold.
For the first time since records
began, more elderly US women died of brain disease than cancer.
Professor Colin Pritchard
of Bournemouth University led the study said "The rate of increase in such
a short time suggests a silent or even a `hidden' epidemic, in which
environmental factors must play a major part, not just aging. Modern living
produces multi-interactional environmental pollution but the changes in human
morbidity, including neurological disease is remarkable and points to
environmental influences."
Professor Prichard continued,
"Furthermore are the practical implications for families trying to cope as
front-line services are being swamped. For example, the remarkable increase in
Motor Neuron Disease in the UK, as well as the earlier dementias. Exemplified
in a new charity `Young Dementia UK, who report that many of their clients are
in their late 40's and early 50's- something unthinkable twenty years ago"
"In part, some of the
results are explained by more effective treatments for cancer and heart
disease, with advances in medicine making such physical illnesses easier to
treat, whilst there have been less advances in the treatment of neurological
conditions"
"Crucially it is not
just because people are living longer to get diseases they previously would not
have lived long enough to develop but older people are developing neurological
disease more than ever before.
The environmental changes
in the last 20 years have seen increases in the human environment of
petro-chemicals -- air transport- quadrupling of motor vehicles, insecticides
and rises in background electro-magnetic-field, and so on."
"These results will
not be welcome news as there are many with short-term vested interests that
will want to ignore them. It is not that we want to stop the modern world but
rather make it safer.
Essentially, it is time
for us to wake up and realize that a major problem we now face is unprecedented
levels of neurological disease, not just the earlier dementias and thinking of
the USA -- `when America sneezes, Europe gets cold a decade later."
Colin Pritchard, Emily Rosenorn-Lanng. Neurological deaths of American adults (55-74) and the over 75′s by sex compared with 20 Western countries 1989-2010: Cause for concern. Surgical Neurology International, 2015; 6 (1): 123 DOI: 10.4103/2152-7806.161420
Bournemouth University. "Is Modern living leading to a ‘hidden epidemic’ of neurological disease?."
ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 6 August 2015.
<www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/08/150806091328.htm>.
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