Dementia may have been caused by the World War II

(We are all a bit like Russian dolls)

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The dementia affecting hundreds of thousands of Britons may be a legacy of the Second World War, a scientist has claimed. Research presented at a conference in York yesterday suggested that traumatic stress can trigger Alzheimer's and other conditions. More than 700,000 people suffer from dementia in the UK and Dr Karen Ritchie, from France's National Institute of Health and Medical Research, believes that many of today's cases could have been caused by armed combat, or by the Blitz.

Her claims are based on studies of French citizens forcibly expelled from Algeria in the 1950s.
Known as the 'pieds noirs', they had crossed the Mediterranean and many had settled in the coastal district around Montpelier, where the research was conducted. She said: 'They had suffered extreme stress, losing their homes, and having their lives threatened, sometimes by people who were once their neighbours. 'The ones who had the worst symptoms (of dementia) now were those who had suffered most at the time. 'These people needed help when they were ten or 20, not when they were 65.'

Dr Ritchie continued: 'Although research has not been carried out on Second World War veterans it is fair to assume that a lot of the dementia we have here in that age group is a result of the war. 'There are people around the world still suffering the trauma of war and other disasters and they too could be part of future generations of dementia. 'We in the post-war generation are lucky to have escaped that kind of large-scale trauma, but it does raise the question of how we would cope if we were faced now with that kind of situation.'

She added: 'We are all a bit like Russian dolls. It may be the child inside us that carries the risk factor.' Dr Ritchie told the conference of the Dementia Services Development Centre that today's UK troops would not suffer the same way because they were trained in advance to deal with traumatic situations. However other causes of trauma, including child abuse, could lay the foundations for dementia in later life. At the same time other risk factors based on lifestyle, such as obesity, smoking, poor diet and low educational attainment could be modified. 'Prevention of dementia should start in the teens and twenties,' she said. 'By the time the symptoms appear it is too late.' Other important factors include depression and certain drugs - especially in women - and heart disease, strokes, and diabetes, which were more likely to affect men. ...http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health

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