Warding off the onset of dementia
Media reports yesterday covered the results of a thirty-four year study of 2,345 men by Cardiff University’s School of Medicine, which appeared to demonstrate that taking up, or keeping to, five simple rules of living may help to resist the onset of dementia.
These were:
Taking regular exercise (perhaps the most important)
Not smoking
Healthy diet
Low alcohol intake
Low bodyweight
The facts emerging from the study make sobering reading. Only 1% of the British population had all five healthy habits and only 4% followed four of the five.
Apparently, if half the men in the survey had taken up just one new healthy habit 30 years ago, this would have resulted in 13% fewer cases of dementia, 12% fewer case of diabetes, a 6% fall in heart disease and 5% fewer deaths.
Healthy living can cut the risk of developing dementia by up to 60%.
This follows a suggestion from a group of senior doctors, headed by Dr Simon Poole, last weekend that a Mediterranean diet – rather than drugs – was the best strategy with which to fight dementia.
Dementia charities and campaigners are calling for global action to fight dementia, which they call the ‘21st Century plague’.
Currently, Britain spends four times more on cancer than it does on dementia.
