Another milestone

The total number of page views of this blog has just passed 10,000.  I just wanted to thank all those who have taken the time to read what I've written.  The blog has become increasingly important to me, both as way of sharing my thoughts and feelings with others, and also because the feedback I get suggests that people find it interesting and useful.

Thanks to the wonders of the internet I'm able to tell you that, although understandably the views are mostly from people in the UK, there is also a significant readership in the US.  Russia and Canada are represented next in the 'league table' with a surprisingly large number of countries also featuring.  I guess dementia fascinates and appals people the world over.

Thanks again to all of you.

A strange statistic

'In 2006, there were 26.6 million (Alzheimer's) sufferers worldwide.' [Wikipedia]
This figure, or one close to it, is quoted time and again. Yet if 1 in 3 of us will develop AD, the number of sufferers worldwide must surely be vastly greater than 26.6 million. Now I can think of a couple of reasons why the proportion of sufferers in other countries might be smaller. In many developing countries people die, on average, much younger, and as Alzheimer's is predominantly a disease of old age most people probably die long before they develop it. Also, we know that the condition often goes undiagnosed even in our relatively developed country so it must be hugely underdiagnosed elsewhere. Even so, I would be very interested to know how the figure has been calculated and whether there are any other explanations for it not being very much higher.