I’m focused on raising awareness and funds for Alzheimer’s these days, yet my social systems awareness from earlier endeavors impacts my approach. As I search for Alzheimer’s articles to comment on here, or post on other social media sites, I note that a few bring up the economic costs of Alzheimer’s, even if that is not the main message to the article. Here are some of my initial thoughts regarding the economics of Alzheimer’s.
There are two economic reasons why I’m focused on raising funds for research that focuses on lifestyle changes, particularly physical exercise. First, these are lower cost “treatments” than the medications now recommended for Alzheimer’s. I know this all too well from the $500+ per month for medications we had to pay before our Plan D Medicare coverage started. Now our total drug cost will be “only” about $1000 over the course of the year.
Second, precisely because they are low-cost our economic system is not set up to fund lifestyle “treatments” research. Lots of corporate dollars go into studying the cellular and molecular impacts of Alzheimer’s because there are big bucks to be had with treating these impacts. I’m not claiming there’s any kind or conspiracy or even resistance through our corporate economic system to funding the more holistic and ecological research that might lead to low cost lifestyle alternatives, just that our system does not provide much of a reward for pursuing this.
So stay tuned as I raise awareness and funds for such alternatives.
