[ExI] LA Times: Scientists can't get their minds around Alzheimer's

[Stathis Papaioannou]

On 28/12/2007, PJ Manney <pjmanney at gmail.com> wrote:

The following passages are particularly interesting:

> Marcelle Morrison-Bogorad, associate director of the National
> Institute on Aging's neuroscience and neuropsychology of aging
> program, finds Bennett's data deeply disturbing.
>
> She said "the distinction is getting fuzzier and fuzzier between
> normal aging and diseases like Alzheimer's disease. This brings into
> question if these people are normal or not. I don't think we can tell
> anymore who is normal.
>
> "It worries me a lot, actually, because we've been trying to reassure
> people who are older that small lapses in memory are part of normal
> aging. . . . This research is suggesting, not proving, that it might
> be a sign of something down the road. That's not good news."
>
> To say that Alzheimer's is normal is not something anyone wants to
> hear. Medicine can't stop people from getting old. And you can't fix
> old age. Other than the simple arithmetic of it, no one really even
> knows what aging is. They know what accompanies it; they haven't a
> clue what causes it.

The implication is that if Alzheimer's is something that accompanies
aging then it's normal, and if it's normal then we just have to accept
it. And then what will we do when it becomes clear that cancer, heart
disease, osteoarthritis etc. are just part of aging and therefore
"normal"?





-- 
Stathis Papaioannou