Review on dementia: a pleomorphic iceberg

Population ageing, urbanization and migration are our time's greatest demographic definers. In the global background of ascending life expectancy, around 10 to 20% of geriatric population experiences mild cognitive impairment. The worldwide incidence is about 10 million, which rationales to one new case every 3 seconds. This unprecedented wave would endanger 82 million by 2030 and 152 million by 2050 (WHO - Global Dementia Observatory). The onus of enhancing cognitive reserve is borne by, one and all of us. With increasing age and lesser involuntary cognitive exercises we undergo day after day, be it from learning routes to GPS or from memorizing numbers to speed dials, the peril of sliding along the slippery slope of degenerative darkness looms at us, silently galloping behind veils of our sedentary, stressful, under stimulating choices in life. This article is a review on the current conditions surrounding dementia, from a public health risk perspective.