The Times: How statins might have spared my mother from dementia

Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias “don’t just suddenly descend on us when we are old”, says James Rowe, professor of cognitive neurology at the University of Cambridge. They develop slowly, hidden, over decades.

How slowly? How many decades? “From our teenage years upwards,” he explains. This slow, deadly creep speaks to the insidious nature of the disease. Which speaks in turn to opportunity. The more we know about what causes dementia, the more we can understand how we might protect ourselves.