Boelter pleads guilty in lawmaker attacks, agrees to two life sentences

MPR News helps you turn down the noise and build shared understanding. Turn up your support for this public resource and keep trusted journalism accessible to all. 

Turn Up Your Support

When I fill in for Kerri Miller on Wednesday, I'm doing a segment on Alzheimer's [update: see above].

If there's a more despicable disease, I'm unaware of it. Perhaps that's why you don't hear a lot of politicians criticizing a huge increase in Alzheimer's research.

“It’s perhaps some of the most encouraging news we’ve had on Alzheimer’s disease in several years,”  Ronald Petersen, director of the Mayo Clinic Study of Aging and the Mayo Alzheimer’s Research Center, told the 

. “This is truly very, very exciting in the field.”

If the future is bright -- or at least: hopeful -- the present is a nightmare, as evidenced by the story in the 

 today of former Gov.  Martin Schreiber and his wife, Elaine.

They have known each other since they were 14-year-old sweethearts. Theirs is a common story: A faithful partner carrying for a spouse who has slipped into the grasp of Alzheimer's, never to return.

You don't have to be alone, to be lonely, he says, exhausted from the rigor of caring for someone with Alzheimer's.

Finally, he moved her to a memory care center.

About five million people have Alzheimer's now. By 2050, that will rise to about 14 million.

When Mom Has Alzheimer's, A Stranger Comes For Christmas

NewsCut

Bob Collins

Author

If there's a more despicable disease, I'm unaware of it. Perhaps that's why you don't hear a lot of politicians criticizing a huge increase in Alzheimer's research.


The bi-partisan budget just passed by Congress included a big boost in funding for the National Institutes of Health. That funding included 50% more money for research into Alzheimer's disease. The director of Mayo Clinic's Alzheimer's Research Center said the additional $350-million in federal funds is the biggest Alzheimer's story of the year. Bob Collins asks the Dr. Ron Petersen about what that money could accomplish in the push to delay or stop the onset of Alzheimer's and other dementia.

The loneliness of the Alzheimer’s care giver

Go Deeper.

Like this?

News you can use in your inbox