The report "Dementia 2010" shows that dementia research remains severely under funded compared to other conditions like cancer and heart disease.
Dementia affects 820,000 people, costing the UK economy £23 billion per year, while dementia research funding is twelve times lower than that for cancer research.
The news comes a year after the government published its National Dementia Strategy. The Alzheimer’s Research Trust, the UK’s leading dementia research charity, warned that “dementia is the greatest medical challenge of the 21st century”.
The report found that each dementia patient costs the British economy more than the average salary and five times more than the average cancer patient. For every £1 million in health and social care costs for the disease, £129,269 is spent on cancer research and just £4,882 on dementia research.
To read the full press release visit the Alzheimer’s Research Trust website:
http://alzheimers-research.org.uk/news/article.php?type=News&id=544