Sen. Susan Collins of Maine will be the keynote speaker at the Alzheimer’s Foundation of America’s national conference next week in Portland.
Sen. Susan Collins
The conference, which will be held from 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. on Aug. 6 at the Portland Regency Hotel in Portland, is free and open to the public. There will be discussions about advances in Alzheimer’s research, as well as free confidential memory screenings and advice on how to prepare for long-term care.
As people live longer, the health care costs associated with Alzheimer’s are expected to balloon from $259 billion in 2017 to $1.1 trillion in 2050, according to the Alzheimer’s Association.
“More than 28,000 Maine residents are living with Alzheimer’s disease; many others are caring for a family member with Alzheimer’s. As those numbers grow, it’s critically important to connect people with information that can help them if Alzheimer’s enters their lives,” Charles J. Fuschillo Jr., the foundation’s president and CEO, said in a statement.
Collins, who is scheduled to speak at 11 a.m., has pushed for additional funding for Alzheimer’s research, and she supports the National Institutes of Health’s proposed $2.8 billion budget for Alzheimer’s research in 2020-21, an increase from the current $2.3 billion.
“An estimated 5.6 million Americans are living with Alzheimer’s today, and an estimated one in three seniors will die with Alzheimer’s disease or another dementia. Unless we find ways to change the trajectory and stop this disease, the number of Americans with Alzheimer’s is expected to climb to nearly 14 million by 2050,” Collins said in a statement. “I have strongly advocated for significant increases in funding for biomedical research. We have made progress in understanding Alzheimer’s disease in recent years, but we still have a long way to go.”
For more information or to register, go to www.alzfdn.org. Those attending can also register at the door.
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