Ohio Department of Aging
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June 2007
Cost of Caring for People with Alzheimer's Worldwide Jumps
The "graying of the world" pushed up the cost of caring for the six million-plus Americans with Alzheimer's disease and other forms of dementia to an estimated $76 billion in 2005, according to a study published in Alzheimer's & Dementia: The Journal of the Alzheimer's Association. Alzheimer's care is expected to account for nearly one-sixth of Medicare's total expenditures in 2007.
Worldwide, the cost of care for 29.3 million people with dementia in 2005 was $315 billion, up significantly from the 2003 worldwide estimate of $250 billion. Researchers attributed this recent acceleration of costs to longer life spans and suggested that it underscores a need for more research into the disease.
Alzheimer's disease is the most common cause of dementia in Americans, the majority of them seniors. Dementia strikes one percent of people between the ages of 60 and 64, and becomes more common as people age, affecting 50 percent in the 85-plus age group.
The worldwide total also included $105 billion for the cost of "informal care," the lost wages of caregivers - many of whom are retired spouses - responsible for providing "support in personal activities of daily life," such as bathing, dressing and grooming. Researchers calculated that 73 percent of dementia patients lived at home in developed countries, such as the United States, and relied on 1.6 hours of informal care per day.
Ohio Department of Aging