A new report involving U.S. Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., calls Alzheimer’s disease “one of the leading public health challenges we face in the 21st century.”
“A diagnosis is a death sentence,” the report says.
The Senate Special Committee on Aging recently released the 97-page report, which explored how Australia, France, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States diagnose and treat Alzheimer’s disease. Corker is the panel’s ranking Republican member.
According to the Alzheimer’s Association, the disease will cost the United States $20 trillion over the next 40 years. Given the steep medical, emotional and financial costs associated with accelerated memory loss, Corker said he hopes the report will help foster debate over how to provide the best care possible.
“My father had Alzheimer’s, so I understand the emotional and financial difficulties facing families dealing with this devastating illness,” the former Chattanooga mayor said in a news release last week.