Australia not equipped to deal with growing 'tsunami' of Alzheimer's cases, advocates warn
By Karen Tan

Australian workplaces are not equipped to deal with the growing numbers of employees with Alzheimer's despite an ageing population and a possible "tsunami" of future cases, advocates have warned.

Dementia affects 340,000 Australians, with 25,000 of them under the age of 65 and the numbers are set to increase by a third in less than 10 years.

Yet despite a delayed retirement age of 70 by the year 2035, there is no national blueprint to cope with the increasing concern.

Alzheimer's Australia chief Carol Bennett warned the figures were a cause for alarm and said she was keen to work with the Federal Government and workplaces to address the issue.

"If we ignore this issue, it's at our peril," Ms Bennett said.

"We've seen the numbers that have increased, and you know, we're going to see an increasing prevalence of the condition, we can't afford to ignore it.

    It can affect anybody. So I've seen a veterinary surgeon for example, who obviously couldn't perform surgery. I've seen a barrister who was no longer able to give legal advice.
    Clinical Neuropsychologist Dr Nicola Gates

"What we've seen is that there has been an increase in the number of younger people getting younger-onset dementia, and we know that about 25,000 young people currently have it in Australia.

"As the prevalence of dementia progresses, we will certainly need to be adjusting and making sure that we've got policies in workplaces as that prevalence increases."

Clinical neuropsychologist Dr Nicola Gates said she was concerned that while much had been done overseas in countries like the UK and Canada to prepare for the advance, the conversation between key players nationally had not even started yet here in Australia.

"You would be looking at 5 to 15 per cent of the workforce over 65 having a cognitive impairment," Dr Gates said.

"I don't think the Australia workplace is currently set. They haven't established policies and procedures, HR departments don't know what to do yet, and the policy changes within government to extend or delay the age of retirement haven't been matched by polices and looking at employment with people with cognitive problems."

Dr Gates anticipates a "tsunami" of cases to deal with in the coming years.

Of particular concern was the potential for a rise in discrimination and litigation cases, affecting employers, the employees with dementia, co-workers and consumers, she said.

"It can affect anybody. So I've seen a veterinary surgeon for example, who obviously couldn't perform surgery. I've seen a barrister who was no longer able to give legal advice," Dr Gates said.

"I think the potential for litigation is very real. If people whose careers have been acted on by bad decisions, bad thinking.

"Similarly within businesses themselves, they may be sued as an organisation because of bad decisions in the upper hierarchy of the organisation."

Australia unprepared for tsunami of alzheimers?

....and one book lasts forever

But this is a very serious issue that I believe is just starting to be mentioned by the media. The government is cutting back on home care for the elderly, the result may well be that we, the ones that are sound of mind will be left to take these poor souls back to their abode when they wander off.

Past governments have been extremely lax in ignoring the huge problem of how to properly care for the tsuname of baby boomers. They didn't just get here all of a sudden, they've been getting older every year and now we have an enormous health and welfare problem on our hands.

I did read one report that said the youth of today won't have access to nursing homes when the time comes.

Let's get it sorted today.....a huge buildathon, homes for everyone and nursing homes for the elderly.

Fewer people and more demented people????? Australia is forecast to hit 35,000,000 in the next 15 years. I don't think so.

Tap wrote on May 4^th, 2015 at 1:22pm:
Indonesia.

Tap wrote on May 4^th, 2015 at 1:22pm:
Indonesia.

Fertility
Australia's total fertility rate (TFR), the average number of children a woman would bear over her lifetime, fell sharply from 3.548 children per woman in 1961 to 1.907 in 1979, and continued to fall steadily for the next 20 years. In 2001, it reached a low of 1.729 children per woman. Since then, it has increased, and in 2008 Australia's TFR was 2.023 babies per woman, the highest level since 1976 when the TFR was 2.06. Since 2008 the TFR has fallen steadily to 1.933 children per woman in 2012.

Total fertility is still below the replacement level of 2.1 births per woman.
Life expectancy

Life expectancy in Australia has increased significantly over the last five decades. Since 1960–62, life expectancy at birth has improved by 12.0 years for males and 10.1 years for females. Based on current mortality rates, a boy born in 2012 can expect to live 79.9 years while a girl can expect to live 84.3 years.
Net overseas migration

Net overseas migration (NOM) is the net gain or loss of population through immigration to Australia and emigration from Australia.

Overseas travellers are included in the population if they are in Australia for a total of 12 months or more over a 16 month period. Conversely, overseas travellers are subtracted from the population if they are away for a total of 12 months or more over a 16 month period. The level of NOM is the balance of these NOM arrivals minus NOM departures.

This method is known as the '12/16 month rule'. It accounts for those persons who may have left Australia briefly and returned, while still being resident for 12 out of 16 months.

NOM can fluctuate considerably from year to year, and has been increasing over the last two years. Final NOM peaked at 315 700 for the year ending December 2008 and then fell, by 45.5 per cent to 172 100 for the year ending December 2010. Since then, NOM has again been increasing and the latest ABS preliminary estimates indicate that NOM was at 238 300 for the year ending March 2013. This is a 37.6 per cent increase over the previous 12 month period but still 24.5 per cent down on the peak.

Currently NOM contributes about 60 per cent of Australia's population growth (for the year ending March 2013) and has outstripped the natural increase (the excess of births over deaths) in the population since 2005.

Further information regarding NOM and NOM forecasting is available on the department's website.
See: The Outlook for Net Overseas Migration
Composition

At 30 June 2011, 27 per cent of the estimated resident population was born overseas (6.0 million).

The countries representing the highest overseas-born populations are the United Kingdom (1 180 160, 19.6 per cent of overseas-born), New Zealand (564 920, 9.4 per cent), the People's Republic of China (391 060, 6.5 per cent), India (343 070, 5.7 per cent) and Vietnam (212 070, 3.5 per cent). Overall, the proportion of overseas-born residents from European countries of birth is declining, while the proportion of migrants coming from Asia and Africa is increasing.