Although there is a growing list of Alzheimer’s disease susceptibility genes, even if you put them all altogether, they account for less than half of all Alzheimer’s cases. The single most compelling piece of data on the potential control we have over the disease is the fact that if you have identical twins, with the exact same genes, even if one gets Alzheimer’s, the other usually does not. So, we have to think about all the other contributing factors beyond just genetics.
In my video on pesticides and cancer, I talked about this study. There’s a list of chlorinated pesticides, including DDE (a metabolite of DDT), that are classified by the EPA as probable human carcinogens. But in the study, blood levels of DDE and others were associated not with increased cancer mortality, but increased risk of other-cause mortality. This led researchers to speculate this may be due to an associated increased risk of diabetes or dementia. I’ve talked previously about the diabetes link. What about dementia? One study: “Elevated Serum Pesticide Levels and Risk for Alzheimer Disease.”
