Nearly half of dementia cases in New Zealand are potentially preventable if 12 risk factors for the syndrome are completely eliminated, researchers say. The 12 risk factors were less education, hypertension, obesity, hearing loss, smoking, depression, physical inactivity, social isolation, diabetes, alcohol, air pollution and traumatic brain injury. For Pacific people the largest contributors were obesity (8.9 per cent), hearing loss (6.6 per cent), and education (6.0 per cent). Top three for Europeans were hearing loss (8.0 per cent), social isolation (5.7 per cent) and obesity (5.3 per cent). For Asians they were hearing loss (7.3 per cent), physical inactivity (5.5 per cent) and hypertension (4.9 per cent).

Source: Stuff July 10, 2021 02:48 UTC