Objective:To learn about the demographic transition in Mexico and estimate the prevalence of dementia in this country in the next 5 decades based on projected data.
Design:Review and data analysis of published information.
Materials and Methods:We studied data from the 2002 National Population Council inform and estimated the prevalence of dementia by sex and age for every quintile of the population 60 to 100+ year old from the year 2000 to 2050.
Results:Mexico is undergoing a demographic transition that will be complete by the year 2050. During this transition, changes in life expectancy, fecundity rate and migration will impact the demographic structure resulting in progressive aging of the population. Aging is one of the most important risk factors for dementia. In industrialized countries it has been estimated that the prevalence of dementia of about 3% for the 60-65 year-old population doubles every 5 years to reach about 50% for the population older than 80 years. In Mexico from the year 2000 to 2050 the life expectancy of 74 years will increase up to 81.3 years (men 79, women 83.6). The probability of dieing in the first year of life will decrease from 23/1000 to 5/1000 in the same time period. The fecundity rate will also fall from 2.11 children/woman in 2000 to 1.85 children/woman in 2050 and there is also an expected raise in the age of marriage and the age at the time of the first childbirth. All this changes including also migration factors will result in an increase of the Mexican population from 100.6 million to 129 million inhabitants by the year 2050. In this same period the median age of the population will increase from 26.6 years to 42.7 years and the percentage of people 60+ years old will also increase from 6.8 % to 28%. On the other hand the economically productive population (15 to 59.8 year old people) will remain relatively constant from 59.8% in 2000 to 62.2% in 2030 and 55.3% in 2050. According to the analysed data in Mexico there were 6.8 million people 60 years old or older in 2000 and there will be 36 million people of this age group in 2050. The estimated number of people with dementia is likely to increase from approximately 980 thousand people to 6.7 million in the same period, in other words in 2050 there will be as many demented people as adults older than 59 years are today. This numbers may be conservative considering that the estimated prevalence of dementia is taken from industrialized countries. Lower level of education, decreased access to health services and other factors that accompany poverty in the elderly might make these estimates larger in Mexico.
Conclusion:The institution of the National Program for Dementias currently in place may help ameliorating or preventing the effects of the demographic changes in this country.
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