C FORCE

BY CHUCK NORRIS

RELEASE: FRIDAY AUGUST 25, 2017

A Question For The Young And Aging

As I discussed last week, if we are going to address our needs as a nation both today and into the future then the first thing that must change are attitudes toward older adults in America. And not just in the way the medical community views them as patients, but by admitting that across the board ageism — the marginalization and chauvinism shown against people of a certain age — must stop. That includes within our nation's workforce. By either choice or by necessity older Americans are now extending their working years. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, by 2024, one quarter of our workforce will be 55 and over. This represents more than twice what it was in 1994.

Rather than pitting young against old in this changing work environment, it's time we see these two generations as having much in common. The Millennial generation, also known as Generation Y, consists of young people who have reached adulthood around the turn of the 21st century. They are the vanguards of the new economic age.

When economists and marketers want to understand changing attitudes toward work and life, they focus on millennials. Among the traits ascribed to millennialism is a preference for multiple jobs over a single job; work that provides flexibility and meaning rather than status and hours at work. It is also said that they value happiness over money.

These young people may be surprised to learn that according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, people over the age of 65 are four times more likely to be self-employed than those under 34, and more likely than young folks to work part-time jobs. Nearly 75 percent of workers over 65 make money from more than one source, excluding Social Security. Far more than Millennials, older workers value meaning over money. Where the younger generation might not be aligned with the workplace views of their parents, they certainly are with the grandparents who may be more into millennial values than they are.

Making this generational connection is important when considering the world we live in - where there are more Americans age 65 and older than at any other time in U.S. history; with the number expected to increase to more than 98 million by 2060. This fact alone should place this generation squarely in the heart of all public policy considerations. Instead, we seem locked in a generational battle against young interests and the interests of the old, as if it were a competition. We cannot afford to let this continue. To do so will come at a steep price.

Let us take Alzheimer's disease, a feared condition associated with the old and aging, as a case in point. It is the most common form of dementia. About 5.4 million Americans currently have Alzheimer's disease. It is a number that will continue to grow rapidly if we do not give the problem of finding better treatments and a possible cure the attention it merits.

Deaths from Alzheimer's disease rose by 55 percent over the last 15 years. The disease is currently listed as the sixth leading cause of death in the United States.

Yet, just as early, AIDS patients were often said to have died of pneumonia or cancer rather than AIDS, researchers could well be underestimating the true number of Alzheimer's deaths. The lingering stigma associated with Alzheimer's disease, as well as other dementias, has likely led to significant underreporting of those brain diseases as the cause of death but to the listing of the complication at the time of death.

According to the Center for Disease Control, there is no cure for Alzheimer's and no long-term medical treatment that has proven to reduce symptoms. At present, researchers have failed to find a treatment that halts or reverses the inevitable loss of memory, function and thinking ability that characterize the illness. Researchers understand very little about how the disease manifests in a particular person. They lack understanding of what underlies the disease.

One area where researchers have succeeded is devising ways to diagnose Alzheimer's earlier. While current treatments do not reverse the disease, if detected soon enough they have been able to stabilize the disease's progression.

Through early detection, researchers hope to engage more individuals in the early stages of Alzheimer's in clinical trials for promising new treatments. In the past, experimental drugs might not have worked because the participants' disease had advanced too far. The testing process used was also imperfect. It is now believed that some participants in these earlier trials were included because they had symptoms similar to Alzheimer's but actually had another form of dementia that progresses differently, responds to different medications and requires different levels of care and treatment.

New research published in the journal Neurology, proposes a diagnostic tool that may be able to detect Alzheimer's. It is able to distinguish Alzheimer's from other forms of dementia, and do so more simply and more cost effectively than the best test now available. But will people in high risks groups who are functional and have not been diagnosed take such tests? My guess is no, not unless current attitudes toward Alzheimer's begin to change.

For people with Alzheimer's disease and their loved ones, the most important mystery to solve is finding a safe and effective treatment for this neurodegenerative disorder. We all benefit from such an outcome.

Write to Chuck Norris ([email protected]) with your questions about health and fitness. Follow Chuck Norris through his official social media sites, on Twitter @chucknorris and Facebook's "Official Chuck Norris Page." He blogs at http://chucknorrisnews.blogspot.com. To find out more about Chuck Norris and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.