World Alzheimer's Day 1997
Race Against Time - World Alzheimer's Day Charter
Reading a clock and telling the time, being able to say what day of the week it is and what month, remembering one's own date of birth and those of friends and relatives. These are everyday things we take for granted.
But telling the time is one of the first losses experienced by a person with dementia.
People with dementia lose their ability to think, to reason and to remember. For them, time has been suspended.
But for the rest of us the clock continues to tick away.
Today on World Alzheimer's Day, another 1,000 people will be diagnosed with dementia across the globe. By the year 2000 there will be almost 18 million people with dementia in the world. That is six times the population of New Zealand.
The majority of these people will have Alzheimer's disease, for which there is no known cure.
In the countdown to the millennium Alzheimer's disease and other forms of dementia represents one of the greatest health and social care challenges facing the planet .
It is a challenge with its own social and economic costs attached. Researchers have recently estimated that the annual cost of providing help and support to a person with dementia is US$358 billion worldwide. [insert cost of dementia care in your country ]
But no one can put a price on the physical and emotional hardship faced by the friends and families caring for someone with dementia.
Meeting this challenge will be a RACE AGAINST TIME.
Just as the relay runner passes on the baton to his team-mate we are passing this message along with our sister organisations around the world on to Alzheimer's Disease International in London.
As it lands on these shores we join the other members of the Alzheimer's Disease International federation in calling on the people of the world to take up this baton and unite in the RACE AGAINST TIME.
A RACE AGAINST TIME with three aims. To provide help and support to people with dementia and their carers. To support health and social care workers and doctors trying to improve the quality of life for people with dementia. To support the work of scientists and researchers worldwide in their search for the causes and a cure for Alzheimer's disease and other forms of dementia.
Where next?
