Trivial things you don't understand/mildly annoy you

[horlock07]

Sunny and hot in glorious Cumbria.

[Sippo]

Typical brits moaning about the weather.

[RobertT]

It's about 23 here today, and sunny.  Rising to 27 ish later.  Hope that helps.

[Audrey]

I wonder why we are so high in comparison

Alzheimer and dementia death rate (per 100,000 people):

1. 🇫🇮 Finland: 54.65
2. 🇬🇧 UK: 42.70
3. 🇸🇰 Slovakia: 38.15
4. 🇦🇱 Albania: 36.92
5. 🇮🇸 Iceland: 35.59
6. 🇧🇳 Brunei: 33.87
7. 🇳🇱 Netherlands: 33.78
8. 🇺🇸 USA: 33.26
9. 🇮🇪 Ireland: 32.23
10. 🇸🇪 Sweden: 30.96
.
11. 🇩🇰 Denmark: 29.41
12. 🇳🇴 Norway: 28.94
13. 🇨🇦 Canada: 27.87
16. 🇳🇿 New Zealand: 24.84
19. 🇨🇭 Switzerland: 23.78
23. 🇦🇺 Australia: 22.63
27. 🇧🇪 Belgium: 22.30
32. 🇪🇸 Spain: 21.52
41. 🇸🇦 Saudi Arabia: 20.52
44. 🇳🇪 Niger: 20.18
59. 🇳🇬 Nigeria: 19.45
61. 🇹🇭 Thailand: 19.33
64. 🇫🇷 France: 19.19
69. 🇹🇷 Turkey: 19.07
74. 🇮🇷 Iran: 18.63
95. 🇭🇺 Hungary: 17.50
97. 🇨🇳 China: 17.36
106. 🇮🇩 Indonesia: 17.01
111. 🇮🇱 Israel: 16.75
118. 🇿🇦 South Africa: 16.44
121. 🇵🇰 Pakistan: 16.30
128. 🇩🇪 Germany: 15.54
134. 🇷🇺 Russia: 15.07
135. 🇮🇹 Italy: 14.86
137. 🇮🇳 India: 14.60
143. 🇨🇿 Czechia: 13.71
147. 🇦🇹 Austria: 13.33
148. 🇪🇬 Egypt: 13.14
151. 🇧🇷 Brazil: 11.93
152. 🇨🇱 Chile: 11.64
154. 🇰🇷 South Korea: 11.04
159. 🇯🇵 Japan: 7.87
167. 🇦🇷 Argentina: 4.95
175. 🇲🇽 Mexico: 2.70
178. 🇻🇪 Venezuela: 2.18
183. 🇸🇬 Singapore: 0.43

[Bennett]

We may have a comparatively older population (on average) and as they're diseases that typically effect the elderly, the greater prevalence of people dying of alzheimers and dementia

[Audrey]

I was thinking along those lines but we must be quite aligned with, say, Germany in age, lifestyle etc and they’re way down the list. I can’t see any correlation between those at the top and those at the bottom.

And then there’s Japan with a large aged population right at the bottom.

[Bennett]

I am desperate to avoid work for the next 40 minutes...

https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/bulletins/dementiaandalzheimersdiseasedeathsincludingcomorbiditiesenglandandwales/2019registrations#main-points

There are several important reasons why the number of deaths from dementia and Alzheimer's disease has increased in recent years, including:

- dementia and Alzheimer's disease are more likely to occur at older ages; more people living longer and surviving other illnesses will result in more deaths related to ageing
- a better understanding of dementia, and improved diagnosis, is also likely to have caused increased reporting of dementia on death certificates; this may be a consequence of initiatives put in place in 2013 to 2014, such as the Prime Minister's challenge on dementia and the government's mandate to NHS England (PDF, 507KB), which included an ambition that two-thirds of the estimated number of people with dementia in England should have a diagnosis
- updates to the coding framework used to code cause of death took place in 2011 and 2014; these updates increased the number of deaths with an underlying cause of dementia (more information on these updates is available in Measuring the data)


The numbers shared don't align with those on the ONS page, maybe they've got different methodologies

[Bennett]

I was thinking along those lines but we must be quite aligned with, say, Germany in age, lifestyle etc and they’re way down the list. I can’t see any correlation between those at the top and those at the bottom.

And then there’s Japan with a large aged population right at the bottom.

Fair points, maybe different ways of recording deaths?
I want your report on my desk Monday morning Auds, work through the weekend if you must

[Audrey]

It’s not the numbers, per se, it’s the disparity between countries. Surprised someone, somewhere hasn’t come up with a plausible reason.

[Bennett]

do you have a link to where you saw the numbers?

DW - i found the source https://www.worldlifeexpectancy.com/cause-of-death/alzheimers-dementia/by-country/

[Audrey]

Site called World of Statistics

[Audrey]

At first glance of that map it looks like what might be called ‘western style’ countries are high. Yet within Europe there are huge differences between the UK - high, and France, Germany, Austria - low.

[Bennett]

Maybe it's that the germans and austrians have a drug we don't to preserve life or that they report things differently? It's self reported* so it's possible comorbidities etc aren't factored in.

*https://iris.who.int/bitstream/handle/10665/344701/9789240033245-eng.pdf

[Audrey]

Well, where the Tories have a few pension payments to save . . .

[fuzzy]

Maybe it is because more of our Alzheimer's sufferers are living long enough to die of the disease instead of something else?