Remote indigenous Amazon tribe has lowest dementia rates in the world
Contributed by Karen Lee
Researchers working with remote indigenous populations in the Bolivian Amazon have found the communities experience extraordinarily low rates of dementia. The new study follows on from prior findings reporting the same groups display almost no cases of age-related heart disease.
The Tsimane (pronounced chee-MAH-nay) are a unique population of around 17,000 people living in remote areas of Bolivia who have been the subject of much research over the past few decades due to their unusually good health in older age.
Feeling Forgotten as Baseball Gets Back to Business
Contributed by Dan Smith
Senior former baseball player and brother of the infamous Pointer Sisters, of the disco 80s gets lost in the red tape…
Every spring for the past several years, Aaron Pointer has climbed his steep driveway, taken a short stroll down the street and opened his mailbox to find a letter from Major League Baseball. Each time, as he walks back to his home, with the Tacoma Narrows Bridge peeking out over the water, he reflects on the long struggle for this small recognition. And then he tears into the envelope, revealing a check for about $900 and a letter explaining how this payment is not guaranteed to continue next year. Read more…
“Wisdom and respect”: what Peru’s forgotten generation can teach us about life and ageing
Contributed by Eric Jackson
Enedina Avilés sits on a rocky ledge surveying the city below. She comes to this spot every evening after spending the day earning a living peeling garlic cloves. “This is her moment of meditation,” says Peruvian photographer Alex Kornhuber.
Avilés’s home, a wooden shack with no running water or electricity, is perched on a hillside on the southern outskirts of Lima. She lived in the mountains for most of her life but moved to the city seven years ago after visiting her son and finding a small patch of land where she could build a house.
Peru had the highest death rate per capita in the world, a result of a desperately ill-equipped health system, lack of medical supplies, overcrowded housing and a huge informal economy. Many older people had no choice bux^t to continue fending for themselves. “I met one man with a walking frame. He was 88 but lived alone and had to go out to buy food and medicine,” says Kornhuber. Read more…