The British Alzheimer’s Society are apparently promoting healthu living advice as a way to avoid or delay the illness. Wow, amazing. One of the great fears of an increasingly geriatric population? And there’s a way to avoid it?

Launching a booklet, Be Headstrong, he said that five steps were necessary to reduce the risks – do not smoke, eat less saturated fat, exercise regularly, lead an active social life and have blood pressure and cholesterol checked regularly. “If we could delay the incidence of dementia by five years we could reduce its incidence by 50 per cent,” he said.

(“He” refers to the society’s director.)

The Society has produced research which suggests that overweight people are twice as likely to get Alzheimer’s, according to the Independent. The information is being linked to this research.

(Sorry, I’m too idle to look at the research. I will of course take the newspaper’s shorthand analysis of it – after it’s been filtered through the Alzheimer’s Association Press launch – as being the truth and leave it at that….. Oh, blimey, I thought that was what we were supposed to do.)

I can’t quite see a clear connection beteen the research and the booklet- it doesn’t even mention overweight in that summary. It even mentions things like “not smoking” when I seem to recall that one of the few benefits of smoking was supposed to be lowering the chance of getting Alzheimer’s, according to research reported in New Scientist a few months ago (Don’t even think about making me look that up.)

Doesn’t this sort of thing sail dangerously close to woo? I mean, this is advice given out on the basis that it will allow you to avoid Alzheimer’s, which seems a bit spurious. Well, quite spurious, if you must.

Let’s just think for a minute- all those “healthy” things. Don’t they sort of characterise people who have a bit of education and spare money and time? Don’t such people generally tend to be healthier generally? On every health measure?

Does observation of things that occur together prove causation?

(It’s raining and Columbo is on TV right now. This happened last week as well. Does showing Colombo cause rain. Does the rain make the Hallmarck channel show old Columbo episodes?)

Isn’t it logical cheating to say that these are the specific things that give the wealthier people their advantages? I would lay out actual money that people living in Hampstead or the Cotswolds have lower Alzheimer rates than say, Glasgow Govan. And that people with double-barrelled surnames have a later onset of Alzheimer’s than the rest of us.

Does that mean, that calling your son Piers Oldmoney-Jenkins or your daughter Cressida Cholmely-Waugh will ensure they don’t get Alzheiners? Well no, but the existing evidence suggests that it’s probably going to work at least as well as following the advice of the Alzheimer’s society.

Oh dear, I’ve forgotten what was I going to say next 🙂