Alzheimer’s Cases Increasing at Rapid Rate

WASHINGTON — Alzheimer’s disease is increasing so fast that more than 22 million people worldwide will be affected by 2025, experts warned Sunday. They urged new research to spot the very earliest symptoms--subtle ones that can emerge a decade before true dementia hits--and hunt for ways to protect these people’s brains.

Already, doctors have discovered that a mild memory impairment sometimes confused with normal aging can progress to full-blown Alzheimer’s at a rate of about 12% a year.

This “mild cognitive impairment” is “a slippery slope to Alzheimer’s,” Dr. Ronald Petersen of the Mayo Clinic said at the world’s largest Alzheimer’s meeting. The challenge now, he said, is “can we predict who will convert more rapidly?”

There is no known cure for Alzheimer’s.