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Watertown, MA—Scientists at Boston Biomedical Research Institute (BBRI) and the University of Pennsylvania have found that combining two chemicals, one of which is the green tea component EGCG, can prevent and destroy a variety of protein structures known as amyloids. Amyloids are the primary culprits in fatal brain disorders such as Alzheimer's, Huntington's, and Parkinson's diseases. Their study, published in the current issue of Nature Chemical Biology (December 2009), may ultimately contribute to future therapies for these diseases. "These findings are significant because it is the first time a combination of specific chemicals has successfully destroyed diverse forms of amyloids...

Alzheimer's caused by cold sore virus? In a connection that sounds borderline preposterous, links have been accumulating between Alzheimer's disease and cold sores....Cold sores are caused by the herpes simplex virus type 1, a type that should not be confused with herpes symplex virus type 2 which is the cause of genital herpes. A growing body of research, suggests that the HSV-1 may also be responsible for the majority of Alzheimer's cases.... "There's clearly a very strong connection," says British researcher, Ruth Itzhaki, Ph.D., speaking one afternoon in her office at the University of Manchester, in northwestern England. A neurobiologist,...

"Embracing Dementia is an excellent resource for families, caregivers, staff, clergy, and counselors! It offers hope and practical help for anyone affected by Alzheimer’s & dementia! It is also available in Large Print edition!"

The standard explanation for what causes Alzheimer's is known as the amyloid hypothesis, which posits that the disease results from of an accumulation of the peptide amyloid beta, the toxic protein fragments that deposit in the brain and become the sticky plaques that have defined Alzheimer's for more than 100 years. Billions of dollars are spent yearly targeting this toxic peptide — but what if this is the wrong target? What if the disease begins much earlier, fueled by a natural process? Reporting in the current edition of the journal Neurobiology of Aging, UCLA professor of psychiatry George Bartzokis argues...

This poem is dedicated to those who suffer from Dementia or Alzheimer's and for family members who find themselves - forgotten. Mum has suffered from Alzheimer's for years and often doesn't not know who I am. If she does, she has no idea when I spoke to her or saw her last. For each week she declines, it's that little bit harder for us all who love her. Medication helps, and she has some good days... Dad lives in the same wing of a nursing home. It's a beautiful place and I'm so glad that Dad can be close by....

WASHINGTON (AP) - More than 35 million people around the world are living with Alzheimer's disease or other types of dementia, says the most in-depth attempt yet to assess the brain-destroying illness—and it's an ominous forecast as the population grays. The new count is about 10 percent higher than what scientists had predicted just a few years ago, because earlier research underestimated Alzheimer's growing impact in developing countries. Barring a medical breakthrough, the World Alzheimer Report projects dementia will nearly double every 20 years. By 2050, it will affect a staggering 115.4 million people, the report concludes.

On Tuesday, Senator Arlen Specter R D-Pa. raised expectations when he told the A.F.L.-C.I.O. convention in Pittsburgh that the Senate has “pounded out an Employees Choice bill which will meet labor’s objectives” and predicted it would pass this year. There was only one problem with his announcement, it was fantasy. The Senate presently has 99 members (because of the death of Ted Kennedy) Arlen Specter was the only one of the 99 that knew about the compromise. In other words it never happened. The Hill spoke to other Senators who tried to politely pull away from Specter's statement

People over 60 who consume moderate amounts of alcohol have a reduced risk for Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias, according to a large review of studies. The analysis, which appeared in the July issue of The American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, reviewed 15 studies that together followed more than 28,000 subjects for at least two years. All the studies controlled for age, sex, smoking and other factors. The studies variously defined light to moderate drinking as 1 to 28 drinks per week. Compared with abstainers, male drinkers reduced their risk for dementia by 45 percent, and women by 27 percent...

In experiments with lab mice especially bred to develop symptoms of Alzheimer's disease, University of South Florida (USF) researchers at the Florida Alzheimer's Disease Research Center ADRC gave the aged animals the equivalent of the caffeine in five cups of coffee a day. The results? Their severe memory impairment was reversed. This study, along with other AD research by the same group of scientists, was just published in the Journal of Alzheimer's Disease. Both studies show that caffeine significantly decreased abnormal levels of beta amyloid (the protein linked to AD) in both the brains and blood of lab rodents who...

LAGUNA WOODS, Calif. — The ladies in the card room are playing bridge, and at their age the game is no hobby. It is a way of life, a daily comfort and challenge, the last communal campfire before all goes dark. “We play for blood,” says Ruth Cummins, 92, before taking a sip of Red Bull at a recent game. “It’s what keeps us going,” adds Georgia Scott, 99. “It’s where our closest friends are.” In recent years scientists have become intensely interested in what could be called a super memory club — the fewer than one in 200 of...

We've all heard it before: a diet rich in fish is good for the heart. But now there's new evidence that eating a healthy dose of PETA's recently rebranded "sea kittens" can help ward off dementia as well. (I couldn't resist posting a quick note about this study on the heels of PETA's "Sea Kitten State Park" proposal.) One of the largest efforts to establish a clear connection between fish and brain health — and the first such study conducted in the developing world — has found that older adults in Asia and Latin America were less likely to develop...

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Sen. John McCain said Thursday the United States must recover from the "moral failures" of human rights abuses and called for Americans to stand on the "right side" of history as a leader of the free world. "I believe American leadership in opposition to human rights abuses, not silence, is the truest expression of our national character," McCain said in a speech to the Junior State of America, a civics education organization for high school students. "The United States since its founding has embraced a set of moral duties, among which I believe is the obligation to...

HOST: Health care. MCCAIN: Needs reform. HOST: That’s two words. [weird laugh] Iraq. MCCAIN: Success. HOST: Arizona. MCCAIN: The best. HOST: US-Mexico Border. McCain: Cartels. HOST: GOP. MCCAIN: Transition. HOST: Sheriff Joe Arpaio:MCCAIN: Umm…

President Obama made a vigorous effort after the election to court Sen. John McCain, hoping his campaign rival would become a Senate advocate for his ambitious agenda. Instead, McCain (R-Ariz.) has emerged as one of the chief gadflies leading Republican opposition to Obama’s biggest legislative initiatives. Nevertheless, Obama and other Democrats still cling to the hope that McCain can be persuaded to help advance their priorities.

He's one hundred years old and his long hands, once strong, are growing translucent. He does not so much sit in his wheelchair as he is held upright and aslant by straps. Even awake his eyes are shut against the glare and the blur of the florescent lights in the roof of the home. His meals of pureed food are spoon fed to him by attendants who speak to him in the tones he once used, long ago, on his infant children. When the drapes in his room are partially opened they reveal a view of a gravel roof, exhaust...

The simple test that can spot Alzheimer's in five minutes By JENNY HOPE 10th June 2009 Doctors have devised a memory test which doubles the chances of detecting early dementia. The Test Your Memory (TYM) method is so simple that patients could be taught to do it themselves. It takes just five minutes to carry out and detects 93 per cent of cases of Alzheimer's, according to a study published in the British Medical Journal online. Twice as effective: The Test Your Memory method doubles the chances of detecting early dementia This makes it almost twice as effective as the...

Judge Puts 'Columbo' Star Falk in Conservatorship Tuesday, June 02, 2009 LOS ANGELES — A judge placed former "Columbo" star Peter Falk in a conservatorship Monday to ensure his daughter could occasionally visit the ailing 81-year-old actor. Falk's wife of more than 30 years, Shera, will remain in control of his personal care and affairs. Falk has advanced dementia, likely from Alzheimer's disease, one of his doctors testified Monday. Catherine Falk petitioned in December to take over her father's affairs despite a sometimes contentious relationship with Falk and his wife. By court order, she will be allowed a 30-minute visit...

Being a sun worshipper could make you cleverer in later life and ward off dementia, claim scientists. Researchers found that increased levels of vitamin D, obtained from exposure to sun or eating oily fish, could help keep our brains in top condition as we age. The findings suggest that retirement to warmer climes or taking dietary supplements could boost your brain's ability to stay active later in life. Scientists at the University of Manchester discovered that higher levels of vitamin D are linked with improved mental ability in middle-aged and older men. The study, published in the Journal of Neurology,...

Keeping the brain active by working later in life may be an effective way to ward off Alzheimer's disease, research suggests. Researchers analysed data from 1,320 dementia patients, including 382 men. They found that for the men, continuing to work late in life helped keep the brain sharp enough to delay dementia taking hold. The study was carried out by the Institute of Psychiatry at King's College London. It features in the International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry. Around 700,000 people in the UK currently have dementia and experts have estimated that by 2051, the number could stand at 1.7m. It...

After a week of increasingly desperate, cowardly excuses, she saved the best for last. Mind-boggling. “We all share great respect for the dedicated men and women of the intelligence community who are deeply committed to the safety and security of the American people,” she said in a statement issued by her office. “My criticism of the manner in which the Bush Administration did not appropriately inform Congress is separate from my respect for those in the intelligence community who work to keep our country safe. “What is important now is to be united in our commitment to ensuring the security...

(snip) SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), ARIZONA: Well, first of all, Neil, they should not be eligible for any benefits. That would be crazy. But the major point here is that President Obama, with great fanfare, announced the closure of Guantanamo Bay, the prison at Gitmo, as we know it, and then, nothing. In other words, they did what, you know, that everybody would like to see done at least around the world, et cetera, but then no addressing of the fundamental issues associated with it. What do you do with the detainees? What sort of system of trials do you...

On Wednesday, September 24, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., phoned Reid and told him, “Harry, I am suspending my campaign to come back and help negotiate a deal.” McCain explained that he was also calling upon Obama to suspend his campaign, and together they could convene a meeting at the Bush White House to help come to a deal on a bailout for Wall Street. Reid didn't think it was such a great idea... "They were on the verge of an agreement, and any such McCain stunt would cost us valuable time," writes Reid, also noting that McCain "had no standing...

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., makes the dubious claim that Sept. 11 hijackers entered the United States through Canada -- just days after Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano came under fire for saying the same thing. What's up with Arizona politicians? Arizona Sen. John McCain made the dubious claim Friday that Sept. 11 hijackers entered the United States through Canada -- just days after Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, the former governor of Arizona, said the same thing. Napolitano retracted her claim on Thursday after Canadian officials chided her for the remark, calling it an unfortunate misconception. Napolitano admitted Thursday that...

SAN FRANCISCO — Maybe it’s time to retire the “senior moment.” These lapses of memory during everyday life — losing your keys or your train of thought — are thought to be more common in older people. Not so, researchers from the University of Waterloo in Canada report March 21 at the annual meeting of the Cognitive Neuroscience Society. Researcher Amanda Clark and her colleagues surveyed 30 adults younger than 25 and 24 people ages 60 to 80 to find out how many slips they make each day. The researchers also devised two lab tests to study attention. One involved...

A new test can accurately detect Alzheimer's disease in its earliest stages, before dementia symptoms surface and widespread damage occurs, U.S. researchers said on Monday. The test, which measures proteins in spinal fluid that can point to Alzheimer's, was 87 percent accurate at predicting which patients with early memory problems and other symptoms of cognitive impairment would eventually be diagnosed with Alzheimer's, they said. "With this test, we can reliably detect and track the progression of Alzheimer's disease," said Leslie Shaw of the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, whose study appears in the Annals of Neurology. Such tests, which...

Miami, FL (AHN) - The more coffee you drink, the less chance you will end up developing mental impairments later in life, a new study suggests. A team of Danish and Swedish researchers concluded in a recent study that middle-aged coffee drinkers could have a significantly less risk of developing dementia, including Alzheimer's disease, later on in life. The team tracked the coffee habits of 1,409 middle-aged men and women for 21 years. During that time, 61 participants developed dementia, 48 of whom developed Alzheimer's. The researchers controlled for socioeconomic factors and health risks like high blood pressure and high...

Reviewed by Louise Chang, MD People Diagnosed With Diabetes Before Age 65 Are More Than Twice as Likely to Develop Dementia, Study Shows Diabetes increases the risk of Alzheimer’s and other types of dementia, according to a new report. The study, which focused on the health of 13,693 Swedish twins, found that people who are diagnosed with diabetes before age 65 have more than double the chance of developing Alzheimer’s disease. The link was not as strong for people diagnosed with diabetes late in life. Weili Xu, PhD of the Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm, Sweden, and colleagues write that their...

LONDON: Keeping a full social calendar may help protect you from dementia, researchers said on Monday. Socially active people who were not easily stressed had a 50% lower risk of developing dementia compared with men and women who were isolated and prone to distress, they reported. “Previous studies have shown that chronic distress can affect parts of the brain, such as the hippocampus, possibly leading to dementia,” lead researcher Hui-Xin Wang of the Karolinska Institute in Sweden said. “But our findings suggest that having a calm and outgoing personality in combination with a socially active lifestyle may decrease the risk...

People who are more laid back are less likely to develop dementia in old age, a study has suggested. Research published in the journal Neurology asked 500 healthy elderly people to fill out questionnaires about their personalities. Those who were calm and relaxed had a 50% lower risk of developing dementia during the six years of the study. UK experts said it offered "compelling evidence" of the need to be "socially active throughout life". There are 700,000 people with dementia in the UK. That number is expected to rise to over one million by 2025 and 1.7 million by 2051....

WASHINGTON (CNN)—Arizona Senator John McCain is adopting a major 2008 campaign slogan for a new political action committee designed to support not only his own planned re-election run in two years, but help him put his stamp on the rebuilding of the Republican Party. The formation of the “Country First” PAC is to be announced Wednesday, two sources familiar with the plans tell CNN. One of the sources called it the “first official step” of the GOP Senator’s re-election campaign. McCain made it clear not long after losing the presidential election that he intended to seek re-election to the Senate...

Less than two weeks from the inauguration that he hoped would usher in his own presidential administration, Senator John McCain announced the formation of a new political action committee that will work to promote Republican causes. Borrowing a slogan from his campaign, Mr. McCain is calling the committee, “Country First,” and it is likely to help lay the foundation for his 2010 re-election bid. In an e-mail message to supporters on Wednesday, Mr. McCain described it as a “grassroots organization” that would take up the challenge of defining “our Republican ideals and message” and support G.O.P. candidates. “With your help...

(Excerpted) And so this movie was really about two gay men and the journey between them. The two gay men are Harvey Milk and Dan White. The two gay men are Barney Frank and Ted Haggard. The two gay men are Tony Kushner and Larry Craig. The two gay men are Frank Kameny and Roy Cohn. And as the years have passed by and HIV churned the gay world as powerfully as plagues and wars often do, these polarities were complemented by any number of variations in between. (...) This is not easy for anyone, let alone for homosexuals. For...

Enlarge ImageTradeoff. The protein SIRT1 rushes to repair broken DNA in aging mammals like this mouse, but the shifting proteins (in red, inset) let gene expression go awry. Credit: Courtesy of Philipp Oberdoerffer/Harvard Medical School It seems there's just no way to beat Father Time. As we age, our chromosomes fracture, and specialized proteins rush in to reverse the damage. But new research shows that in doing so, these proteins inadvertently switch on genes that can contribute to aging, allowing senescence to march ever onward. The idea that a protein might patch up a rickety, aging chromosome is not...

Gov. Janet Napolitano's spokeswoman confirmed Thursday that U.S. Sen. John McCain (R-Phoenix) called to congratulate her on being the "top contender' for the job of Secretary of Homeland Security in President-elect Barack Obama's Cabinet. A release put out by McCain Thursday said: "Senator McCain called and congratulated Governor Janet Napolitano on her emergence as top contender for Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security. Senator McCain said 'Governor Napolitano's experience as the former U.S. Attorney for Arizona, Arizona's Attorney General, and as Governor warrants her rapid confirmation by the Senate and I hope she is quickly confirmed.' Senator McCain looks...

I knew 'Opie" was a naive little kid, but I thought Andy was the wise one! Say it ain't so, Andy?? From the Yahoo! Newsroom, October 23, 2008Celebs go to great lengths for Obama excerpt: Luckily for Obama, some celebrities are taking extreme measures to show their support for him. It's no surprise to see celebrities lining up for the Democratic ticket, but these stars are going above and beyond the normal call of duty. First up, we have director Ron Howard resurrecting not one, but two, classic roles that he admits he'd rather leave behind: Opie Taylor from...

Renegade Night on Hardball. First up, Bill Weld. The former Republican governor of Massachusetts, who has endorsed Obama, told Chris Matthews he believed the Dem candidate would, as president, reach across the aisle to govern. Weld didn't—couldn't—cite anything to support his assertion out of Obama's hyper-partisan Senate record in which he's toed the Harry Reid line 97% of the time. But as apostasy goes, that was small potatoes compared to Christopher Hitchens. The God Is Not Great author who, despite his support for the Iraq war, has also recently endorsed Obama, told Matthews he believes McCain is "borderline senile." View...

When she said people with Alzheimer's should be able to appoint someone to request euthanasia for them, Britain's leading medical ethicist, Baroness Mary Warnock, caused a firestorm of controversy.   A similar, but little known, proposal was made by those in the forefront of Oregon's assisted-suicide law and the current Washington State initiative to legalize assisted suicide. The following open letter to Baroness Warnock explains how she will be far more likely to move toward her goal if she follows the Oregon model.   Dear Baroness, Your recent interview on a duty to die certainly caused a stir when you said you...

Joe Biden's denunciation of his own campaign's ad to Katie Couric got so much attention last night that another odd note in the interview slipped by. He was speaking about the role of the White House in a financial crisis. "When the stock market crashed, Franklin Roosevelt got on the television and didn't just talk about the princes of greed," Biden told Couric. "He said, 'Look, here's what happened.'" As Reason's Jesse Walker footnotes it: "And if you owned an experimental TV set in 1929, you would have seen him. And you would have said to yourself, 'Who is that...

<p>In yet another revealing moment for nationalized health care, a highly respected British ethicist said that dementia sufferers should get euthanized in order to preserve resources for healthier people. Baroness Warnock, described as “Britain’s leading moral philosopher”, said that the government should license people to be “put down”</p>

In St. Paul, Palin was told to cancel a meeting with Phyllis Schlafly and pro-life conservatives. McCain's operatives said Palin had to rest for her Wednesday convention speech. Yet, on Tuesday, Palin was behind closed doors with Joe Lieberman and officials of the Israeli lobby AIPAC. There, according to The Washington Post, Palin took and passed her oral exams.

LONDON, Aug. 25 -- The daughter of former prime minister Margaret Thatcher said Britain's "Iron Lady" is suffering from dementia, the family's first public confirmation of what has been widely rumored in Britain for several years. Thatcher's condition has deteriorated so much that she forgets that her husband, Denis Thatcher, died in 2003, her daughter said in a memoir that is to be published next month and was serialized over the weekend in the Mail on Sunday newspaper. "I had to keep giving her the bad news over and over again," Carol Thatcher wrote. "Every time it finally sank in...

The daughter of British former prime minister Margaret Thatcher tells how her mother's dementia has left her struggling to remember the simplest facts in book extracts published Sunday. Carol Thatcher wrote that, on her worst days, her mother struggles to finish sentences but shows occasional glimpses of her old self, particularly when talking about her time in Downing Street. "I had always thought of her as ageless, timeless and 100 percent cast-iron damage-proof," Carol Thatcher wrote in her memoir, "A Swim-On Part In The Goldfish Bowl", which was serialised in the Mail on Sunday newspaper. "Whereas previously you never had...

This appears to be a large topic of discussion over at Democratic Underground and Daily Kos. The diary at Daily Kos has over 800 posts, and three diaries have been spawned from it. They are discussing the Daily Kos diary at Democratic Underground as well. If you check out the link, you can read the diary with Solzhenitsyn's story. The stories are similar, but they aren't identical. The liberals are speculating that McCain either knowingly stole the story, or he is in the early stages of dementia and mistook Solzhenitsyn's experience as his own. I give McCain the benefit of...

The [Obama] campaign’s assertion (and exercise) of a right to exercise editorial control, “in our sole discretion,” does not absolve it of responsibility for the content; it makes it 100 percent responsible for the content. This includes a vicious rumor to the effect that John McCain has an age-related neurodegenrative disease. Before we continue, we understand that repetition of this rumor, even for the purpose of condemnation, gives it wider publicity. We must therefore add up front that Barack Obama’s history of cocaine use places him at higher risk for mental impairment while rendering him unfit to control nuclear weapons...

ANN ARBOR, Mich., Jan 01, 2003 (United Press International via COMTEX) -- Cocaine appears to damage and perhaps destroy the brain cells associated with the "high" it produces, researchers reported Wednesday. "...the specific neurons interacting with cocaine are disturbed, damaged and maybe destroyed in the drug-use process."

LONDON (Reuters) - Eating tuna and other fatty fish may help prevent memory loss in addition to reducing the risk of stroke, Finnish researchers said on Monday. People who ate baked or broiled -- but not fried -- fish high in omega-3 fatty acids have been found to be less likely to have "silent" brain lesions that can cause memory loss and dementia and are linked to a higher risk of stroke, said Jyrki Virtanen of the University of Kuopio in Finland.

In his 2002 book, "Worth the Fighting For," John McCain offered this confession -- an acknowledgment of a restless mind: "Although I seem to tolerate introspection better the older I am, there are still too many claims on my attention to permit more than the briefest excursions down the path of self-awareness. When I am no longer busy with politics, and with my own ambitions, I hope to have more time to examine what I have done and failed to do with my career, and why."

Drugs designed to fight cholesterol might also prevent Alzheimer’s and other dementia Older people taking statin drugs are less likely to develop dementia than their counterparts who don’t take the pills, a study in the July 29 Neurology suggests. While the provocative finding offers hope that the cholesterol-reducing drugs might help against Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of dementia, scientists say this study is unlikely to be the last word on the topic. Indeed, it may just fuel an already lively debate over statins’ potential effect on dementia. Some research has hinted at benefits, while other studies, particularly in people...

First the Iraqi government gave Senator Barack Obama a boost by seeming to embrace his proposal for a 16-month timetable for withdrawing American troops from Iraq. But could Senator John McCain, who built his candidacy in large part on his opposition to a timetable for withdrawal from Iraq, possibly be following suit? “I think it’s a pretty good timetable,” Mr. McCain said Friday in an interview on CNN’s “The Situation Room,’’ before adding that it should be based “on the conditions on the ground.’’ For months Mr. McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee, has railed against setting timetables for withdrawing from...

Senator John McCain (R-Ariz.) said “Iraq” when he apparently meant “Afghanistan” on Monday, adding to a string of mixed-up word choices that is giving ammunition to the opposition. Just in the past three weeks, McCain has mixed up Iraq and Afghanistan, Somalia and Sudan, and even football’s Packers and Steelers. Ironically, the errors have been concentrated in what should be his area of expertise - foreign affairs.