Health Care Is Not Enough to Prevent Dementia

Abstract

With an aging population, an increase in cases of Alzheimer’s disease and dementia worldwide poses a significant health burden. While we hope for a cure, preventing dementia by reducing risks is important for global population health. Prevention strategies are difficult to implement when facing inequality across the world for access to healthy lifestyles. An approach that centers on individual responsibility and health professional interventions for targeted groups may risk missing the policy and environmental drivers of change. Barriers and enablers need to be explored and interventions are needed at individual, structural and social levels to normalize mid-life risk reduction.