Early Onset Dementia and Alzheimer’s is on the Rise for Young Adults

The prevalence of dementia is dramatically increasing for young Americans, according to a recent report from Blue Cross and Blue Shield. The analysis revealed that the rate of dementia has jumped 200% among commercially insured Americans between the ages of 30 and 64 over a recent five-year period. In 2017, 131,000 people between the ages of 30 and 64 were diagnosed with either dementia or early-onset Alzheimer’s. Even more startling, the average age of someone with either condition is 49. And, as widely reported elsewhere, women are disproportionately impacted compared to men. 

The statistics are even more shocking when you break them down by age group. In 2013, only 0.9% of those aged 30-44 years old were affected compared to 4.4% in 2017, representing a sharp 373% increase. This trend continues among other young Americans, with a 311% increase among those aged 45-54 and a 143% increase among those aged 54-60 years of age.

With the global pandemic, numbers are likely to continue rising as more and more people are affected by long COVID syndrome. Other factors that may be contributing to this earlier onset are our stressful modern lifestyles, unhealthy food supply, and increasingly toxic environment.

Alzheimer’s has been a leading cause of death worldwide for decades and is currently in seventh place globally, according to the most recent World Health Organization statistics. It’s also a leading cause of disability and dependency among those affected. This is especially noteworthy given that mainstream medicine has no sustainable treatment for Alzheimer’s disease, which is considered to be a progressive, fatal condition. 

The news isn’t all bleak, as the Bredesen Protocol® offers hope, especially to those in the early stages. A recent clinical trial demonstrated improvement in 84% of those who used this approach, in sharp contrast to the over 400 failed trials from big pharmaceutical corporations. Because researchers agree that the pathology behind Alzheimer’s begins at least a decade before the first symptom appears, “It just makes sense to practice a brain-healthy diet and lifestyle to optimally support cognition until we can better pinpoint what is contributing to the sharp rise in early-onset dementia cases,” according to Julie Gregory, the Chief Health Liaison for Apollo Health, that offers the Bredesen Protocol through their PreCODE Program® for prevention and ReCODE Program™ for reversal.