The number of people with dementia, which currently costs the United Kingdom £17bn (€25bn; $33bn) a year, will increase from 700 000 at present to more than a million in less than 20 years and to 1.7 million by 2050, creating a potential medical and social crisis, a new report says.
The report by the Alzheimer's Society into the social and economic costs of dementia warns that urgent action is needed to plan for the rapid increase in the number of people in the UK with the illness.
It calls for better investment in dementia research and services and more efficient use of available funding. It says that planning now will save lives and money in the future.
The report, from academics at the London School of Economics and King's College London, says that the cost of providing the present level of care to people with dementia will triple over the next 30 years.
Neil Hunt, chief executive of the Alzheimer's Society, said: “We must tackle this huge challenge head on with a national dementia strategy. We need to invest in dementia services, research, support, and training and use what money is being spent more effectively. Planning now will save lives and money in the future.”
The report also says that poor understanding of dementia and its consequences is currently leading to underdiagnosis, late diagnosis, and an inadequate care response.
It says: “Without significant focus on improving care across health and social care, outcomes will get worse and resources will be squandered.
“We must go beyond the current dementia options in the Quality and Outcomes Framework for GPs to improve the early identification, diagnosis and management of dementia by GPs.”
The report criticises the government for failing in the past to prioritise dementia, resulting in care of people with dementia being delivered piecemeal and in an inefficient fashion. It calls for an urgent review of UK medical research to set up a more ambitious funding programme into the causes, prevention, cure, and care of dementia. Public funding of dementia care research is £7 per head of population in the UK, whereas the United States spends £52 per person.
Martin Knapp of the London School of Economics, one of the research directors, said, “This research highlights the desperate need for dementia to be made a national priority.
“Dementia is one of the main causes of disability later in life, ahead of cancer, cardiovascular disease, and stroke, yet funding for dementia research is significantly lower than these other conditions.”
Commenting on the report the health minister Ivan Lewis said, “The time is right for a focus on dementia—changes in health patterns and demography make dementia an issue which this government takes very seriously indeed.
“We have made a strong commitment to improving services for people with Alzheimer's disease and other forms of dementia, and dementia has already been identified as a key healthcare priority. Alzheimer's disease is one of four areas targeted to benefit from an extra £100m per year research and development funding by 2008.”
Dementia UK can be found at www.alzheimers.org.uk.