Neurological conditions affect 3.4B people worldwide. What about Canada?

Neurological conditions, such as Alzheimer's disease, migraines, stroke and multiple sclerosis, are now the leading of ill health and disability around the world.

Neurological conditions, such as Alzheimer’s disease, migraines, stroke and multiple sclerosis are now the leading cause of ill health and disability around the world, affecting 3.4 billion people, according to a new study.

The study, published Thursday in Lancet Neurology, found that these neurological conditions affected 43 per cent of the world population and caused more than 11 million deaths in 2021

“The worldwide neurological burden is growing very fast and will put even more pressure on health systems in the coming decades,” said co-senior author Valery Feigin, the director of Auckland University’s National Institute for Stroke and Applied Neuroscience in New Zealand.

“Yet many current strategies for reducing neurological conditions have low effectiveness or are not sufficiently deployed, as is the case with some of the fastest-growing but largely preventable conditions like diabetic neuropathy and neonatal disorders. For many other conditions, there is no cure, underscoring the importance of greater investment and research into novel interventions and potentially modifiable risk factors,” he said in a Thursday media release.

The study, Global Burden of Disease, Injuries and Risk Factors Study (GBD) 2021, builds on previous versions to provide the “largest and most comprehensive analysis” of the prevalence and impact of nervous system disorders across countries worldwide from 1990 to 2021, it said. The analysis also broadened its scope by examining 37 neurological conditions, a substantial increase from the previous 15.

It found the number of people living with or dying from neurological conditions such as dementia and meningitis has risen 18 per cent over the last 30 years. The increase, the authors say, is largely due to an aging and growing population worldwide.

The top 10 contributors to neurological health loss in 2021 were stroke, brain injury, migraine, Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias, diabetic neuropathy (nerve damage), meningitis, epilepsy, neurological complications from preterm birth, autism spectrum disorder, and nervous system cancers.

Neurological consequences of COVID-19 ranked number 20, accounting for 2.48 million years of healthy life lost in 2021.