Long-term exposure to outdoor air pollution linked to increased risk of dementia

Diameter, not weight. PM2.5 is particles of diameter 2.5μm or less.

> 0.3 micrometers are even smaller than the wavelength of light, which demonstrates the problem: how should we see something that is smaller than light itself?

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S266601722... (this groups methods can be substantially improved).

Having done some additional follow on work in the space -- the results definitely do not follow socioeconomic boundaries as one might expect.

Roads are a huge contributor.

On a personal note to anyone in this situation: Do not go it alone. Being a caregiver is hard, but being a caregiver for someone with serious memory issues is brutal and requires 24/7 monitoring. Your loved one will not always cooperate. They may change into someone who does not resemble the person you knew. Many states require such persons to be homed somewhere with a 24/7 nursing staff. Plan accordingly.

As hard as it is, supporting family members also need to learn to prioritize taking care of themselves and avoiding a spiral towards burnout. With dementia, there is often a time when the patient needs a more controlled environment with 24x7 supervision. Dementia sleep schedules and behaviors fall apart and are not really compatible with a family caregiver's own health needs.

Depending on the dementia case, risky behaviors may emerge at night, and having observant caregivers awake 24x7 may be very important. The financial picture for this is quite difficult in the US. Normally this requires a care facility at some point, as it is impossibly expensive to bring sufficient dementia care via visiting professionals.

To safely handle dementia with "sundowning" and wandering behaviors, you usually need a facility that has about a dozen residents or more. Then, budgets allow for multiple onsite staff and overnight wakeful staff. This can bring more distinct staff roles too, e.g. cooking and housekeeping versus care.

Even this may be overwhelmingly costly, to the point where the dementia ends up depleting the estate and then shifting to some kind of government support. For family or trustees managing this process, it is full of difficult decisions regarding budget and care tradeoffs. For example, do you splurge on "nicer" facilities or other caregiver factors early on, or try to reserve more funds for the inevitable crises? Dementia can be a drawn-out process, where care needs expand to a crescendo before collapsing back to hospice care, which may be more like other terminal illnesses.

Just type it into a calculator. The computer will do all the work.

Current world population is ~8 billion so 57_000_000 / 8_000_000_000 = 0.007125

So 0.7% or 7 per 1000 people.

"The Lancet study indicates that although the total number of dementia cases is expected to increase substantially, the percentage of the global population affected, once age-adjusted, remains nearly constant, with just a 0.1% change globally between 2019 and 2050"

Lithium can be viewed an antioxidant – correctly or not?, I do not know.

Air pollution can be viewed as oxidative stress.

It’s interesting to search Google Scholar for “lithium antioxidant”.

https://arstechnica.com/science/2024/07/coal-pollution-is-ki... | https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S001393512... | https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2024.118787

Warehouses:

Air pollution impacts from warehousing in the United States uncovered with satellite data - https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-024-50000-0 | https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-024-50000-0

Where Warehouses Are Built, Air Pollution Follows - https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/153471/where-wareho...

Impact of Warehouse Expansion on Ambient PM2.5 and Elemental Carbon Levels in Southern California's Disadvantaged Communities: A Two-Decade Analysis - https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2024GH00... | https://doi.org/10.1029/2024GH001091

Global air quality map: https://explore.openaq.org/

(this is why it is so important to electrify trucks and to disallow industrial and commercial parks with lots of truck traffic near residential and school areas; all of this combustion/fossil energy pollution is creating health debt that will catch up with us)

As a motorbike rider I can taste the diesel fumes as soon as I'm behind one in a way that's unlike any petrol car.

There's large particulates being thrown out by even the most luxurious diesel cars that you simply couldn't tell if you're behind in a car.

IKEA has recently released a decent air filter for ~$40.

Good ones cost a bit more, but even the basic one removes plenty of small particles with an HEPA-like stage.

But they also show that it instead of eliminating the root cause of the disease, the solution might be eliminating its symptoms instead. Cause one woman who had the gene defied all odds and exhibited the symptom of the disease in her 70s. The reasoning is that another gene she had, the Christchurch gene, protected her brain from the disease. So if someone can use that info to prevent symptoms of the disease eliminating the root cause would become secondary.