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Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a rather new phenomena in records of our species. Until recently, AD has typically affected older people, but in Finland, which has most cases of Alzheimer's disease per capita in the world, researchers have noted what they call “early-onset dementia (EOD), characterized by the onset of the disease before the age of 65”. Here's the summary of the results:
“In the population aged ≤65 years, crude incidence of EOD was 12.3/100,000 persons at risk/year based on 794 new cases from January 1, 2010, to December 31, 2021. Incidence rates for EOD were 20.5 and 33.7 per 100,000 person years in the age group of 30-64 and 45-64 years, respectively. The prevalence of EOD was 110.4 in the age group of 30-64 years and 190.3 in the age group 45-64. Alzheimer disease (AD) (48.2%) and behavioral variant frontotemporal dementia (12.7%) were the most frequent subtypes. The incidence of AD increased during the follow-up, whereas incidence of other forms of EOD remained stable”.Alzheimer's is also twice as common among women compared to men.
According to World population review (2024):
“The country with the most cases of Alzheimer's Disease is Finland. There are 54.65 cases of Alzheimer's for every 100,000 people in this country. These numbers and statistics put Finland in the extremely high occurrence and high prevalence range for the disease. Interestingly, females are much more likely to have Alzheimer's in Finland than males. For every 100,000 people, Alzheimer's impacts 55.32 females compared to just 52.10 males”.A marker for Alzheimer's is sudden aggression (Alzheimer's association).
Why do (1) Finns in general suffer from AD more often compared to the rest of the world, (2) women in particular suffer from the disease, (3) people under 65 contracting the disease?
Eiser (2017) hypothesized that it is about environmental factors, the cold climate, mold, and that lakes may contain cyanobacteria. If that were true, Sweden, whose environment is similar to Finland's, should have the same prevalence of the disease.
In 2023, the EU and OECD published data on mental health in the EU countries (Finland; Sweden).
Here's what the report say about circulatory diseases, cancer, and Alzheimer and other dementia
Sweden:
Finland:
Ergo. Alzheimer's disease is twice as common in Finland compared to Sweden. Environmental factors can be ruled out.
Another factor is biology. Many Finns, especially those who do not speak Swedish claim that Finns originate from the east. According to the Finnish blood donation organization (April, 2023), 16% of the Finnish population originate from the east. Most Finns originate from some other direction. The likely implication is that most Finns originate from the west - Sweden. If that's true, biology can also be ruled out.
Still, Finns', compared to Swede's, seem to have worse physical and mental health. These are the introductions to health survey EUs report 2023:
The gender gap in Sweden is lower compared to the EU:
Whereas the gender gap in Finland is closer to EU:
Disabilities.
Sweden:
Finland and Sweden share a longstanding history, basically from the Vendel period (540 - 750 AD) when the first exploration from Tiundaland in Svitjod reached Haga borg in Janakkala, just south of Tavastehus, until the present. That means that people from Svitjod settled in what became the Eastern part of the kingdom (Svitjod and after 1384, Sweden). Swedish became the trading language around the Gulf of Bothnia and the Baltic sea, including the eastern part of the king (Finland). The implication: renaissance, science revolution, and enlightenment (McKneown, 2009; Widmalm, 2012). This remained until 1910 - 1940.
While most people in the eastern part of the kingdom spoke the trading language, tribes in the inland, towards Karelia, spoke other, Uralic languages which no longer exist. In 1543-48, a Swedish priest from Pernåbygd, Mikael Olofsson (1507-1557) decided to baptize people in these tribes. For that purpose, he created a standardized version of these tribal languages in three publications. In 1551, he also published a record of their gods. One of them was Ilmarinen, the god of air. Olofsson changed his name to Agrikola. Later, the 'k' in the name was replaced by a 'c'.
Agricola's work was continued by Henrik Gabriel Porthan (1739-1804), a professor of philosophy and rector for The Royal Academy of Åbo, founded by Queen Christina (1626-1689) in 1640. Dr. Porthan became a Fennophile, basing his writing about Finnish history on mythology and folk poetry. Some myths probably originated from Agricola.
1808. Russia invaded the Swedish fortress Sveaborg (1748 -), and two years later, the Fennoman movement, basically Dr. Porthan's mythological approach to Finnish history was established. Finland also became a vassal state of Russia, on paper a grand duchy. This increased the tension towards the Swedish speaking majority population. In 1863, Kreml demanded the Finns to abandon the trading language around the Gulf of Bothnia and the Baltic sea in favor of a version of the Uralic languages standardized by Agricola. There are several current markers which together suggest the following:
But here's the catch. In Finland, the sample taken in North Karelia for The Seven countries study became the North Karelia project. The sample from Åbo is forgotten (or maybe suppressed?). Together with Finland's Institute for Health and welfare (THL), the university of Helsingfors pride themselves of having convinced Finns to reduce their consumption of butter and salt. Butter because of the diet-heart hypothesis. Salt because it is said to elevate blood pressure.
In 1971, ~25 men and ~25 women died because of Alzheimer's, and that number was steady until 1980. Then the number of cases started to increase (link). < br />
But the diet-heart hypothesis has been rejected on several occasions (Howard et al. 2006; Nutrition coalition, 2021,Ramsden et al. 2016; Teicholz, 2014). And decreasing the consumption of salt under one teaspoon per day, increases the probability to contract CVD (Mente, 2018; Mente et al. 2021). Research on the relation between salt consumption and Alzheimer's is inconclusive (Mohan et al. 2020). Daily consumption of sugary beverages and daily fruit juice was associated with lower total brain volume and poorer performance on tests of episodic memory (Pase et al. 2017).
In Finland, cake-day is very common. That means people in general seem to take the chance to celebrate as often as possible, drinking sparkling wine, and consuming multiple kinds of cakes. Cake-day is bad for physical and mental health (Hall et al. 2019; Lustig, 2017; Yudkin, 1972).
Finland is also very tribal from a socio-cultural point of view. That means you sustain tradition, reject information from the outside, and apply moral shaming (Pagel, 2019).
Conclusion. Finland is the global leader in Alzheimer's disease (AD), and people at lower age are contracting the disease. Despite having the same biology, environment, and socio-culture, AD is twice as prevalent i Finland compared to Sweden and also twice as common among women. Alzheimer's is associated s with sudden aggression, which is congruent to relational aggressiveness, typically a female phenomenon which is very common in Finland. 40% of school kids are affected. Why is AD so prevalent in Finland? The short answer: change in language which led to an increase of tribalism. The implication: sustaining false conclusions from North Karelia Project deprived Finns from eating butter, meat, and salt, and increased the consumption of sugar ultra-processed food, a 'lethal' combination for the brain (and the heart). It seems like Finnish women's relational aggressiveness is the precursor (marker) to Alzheimer's.
Please support the blog via Swish (Sweden) or MobilePay (Finland).
More about my expertise:
Executive coaching for CEOs/managers and workshops to facilitate Organizational Performance, Learning, and Creativity for Problem Solving | Lectures: Nutrition for physical and mental health | Course/lecture: children's emotional and social adjustment and cognitive development | Language training - Swedish | Academy Competency | CV | Teaching skills and experience | Summary of research project | Instagram | Linkedin | YouTube-channel | TikTok | Twitter
Eiser (2017) hypothesized that it is about environmental factors, the cold climate, mold, and that lakes may contain cyanobacteria. If that were true, Sweden, whose environment is similar to Finland's, should have the same prevalence of the disease.
In 2023, the EU and OECD published data on mental health in the EU countries (Finland; Sweden).
Here's what the report say about circulatory diseases, cancer, and Alzheimer and other dementia
Sweden:
Finland:
Ergo. Alzheimer's disease is twice as common in Finland compared to Sweden. Environmental factors can be ruled out.
Another factor is biology. Many Finns, especially those who do not speak Swedish claim that Finns originate from the east. According to the Finnish blood donation organization (April, 2023), 16% of the Finnish population originate from the east. Most Finns originate from some other direction. The likely implication is that most Finns originate from the west - Sweden. If that's true, biology can also be ruled out.
Still, Finns', compared to Swede's, seem to have worse physical and mental health. These are the introductions to health survey EUs report 2023:
“The leading causes of mental health issues in Finland in 2019 were depressive, anxiety, and alcohol and drug-use disorders. As in other countries, depression is more prevalent among people in the lowest income group, especially among women. Despite the reduction in recent decades, suicide rates in Finland remain higher than the EU average”.
“About 17 % of people had a mental health issue in Sweden in 2019, which is close to the EU average. Common disorders include anxiety and depression, with higher prevalence among women and those on lower incomes: 16 % of men and 18 % of women in the lowest income quintile reported depression in 2019, compared to 8 % of men and 9 % of women in the highest income quintile”.Life expectancy. On average, the lifespan for Swedes is 2 years longer compared to that of Finns.
The gender gap in Sweden is lower compared to the EU:
Whereas the gender gap in Finland is closer to EU:
Disabilities.
Sweden:
“In comparison to other EU countries, in Sweden women and men at 65 enjoy a significantly higher proportion of their additional years of life without disabilities, so the gap in healthy life years between Sweden and the EU average is even wider. Nevertheless, similar to other countries, the gender gap in healthy life years at 65 between Swedish men and women is smaller than the gap in life expectancy. This is because women tend to spend a greater portion of their remaining life years living with disabilities and limitations in daily activities” (p. 5).Finland:
“However, the gender gap in healthy life years (defined as disability-free life expectancy) was much smaller (less than a year) because women spend a greater proportion of their remaining years of life after age 65 with some activity limitations (disabilities)” (p. 5).There seems to be another factor left - life-style. Manners and lifestyle are very similar between people around the Gulf of Bothnia and the Baltic sea, and in particular between Helsingfors - Stockholm, Umeå - Vasa, and Haparanda - Torneå/Kemi. That means that you can expect to find more similarities than differences between the countries in general and between these areas in particular. That in turn should mean that concerns in Finland should also be manifested in a similar way in Sweden, and vice versa. But that's not the case. Why?
Finland and Sweden share a longstanding history, basically from the Vendel period (540 - 750 AD) when the first exploration from Tiundaland in Svitjod reached Haga borg in Janakkala, just south of Tavastehus, until the present. That means that people from Svitjod settled in what became the Eastern part of the kingdom (Svitjod and after 1384, Sweden). Swedish became the trading language around the Gulf of Bothnia and the Baltic sea, including the eastern part of the king (Finland). The implication: renaissance, science revolution, and enlightenment (McKneown, 2009; Widmalm, 2012). This remained until 1910 - 1940.
While most people in the eastern part of the kingdom spoke the trading language, tribes in the inland, towards Karelia, spoke other, Uralic languages which no longer exist. In 1543-48, a Swedish priest from Pernåbygd, Mikael Olofsson (1507-1557) decided to baptize people in these tribes. For that purpose, he created a standardized version of these tribal languages in three publications. In 1551, he also published a record of their gods. One of them was Ilmarinen, the god of air. Olofsson changed his name to Agrikola. Later, the 'k' in the name was replaced by a 'c'.
Agricola's work was continued by Henrik Gabriel Porthan (1739-1804), a professor of philosophy and rector for The Royal Academy of Åbo, founded by Queen Christina (1626-1689) in 1640. Dr. Porthan became a Fennophile, basing his writing about Finnish history on mythology and folk poetry. Some myths probably originated from Agricola.
1808. Russia invaded the Swedish fortress Sveaborg (1748 -), and two years later, the Fennoman movement, basically Dr. Porthan's mythological approach to Finnish history was established. Finland also became a vassal state of Russia, on paper a grand duchy. This increased the tension towards the Swedish speaking majority population. In 1863, Kreml demanded the Finns to abandon the trading language around the Gulf of Bothnia and the Baltic sea in favor of a version of the Uralic languages standardized by Agricola. There are several current markers which together suggest the following:
- In the late 1950s, Finland, but not Sweden, became one of the countries in the Seven Countries study, which aimed to test the diet-heart hypothesis - that saturated fats elevate serum cholesterol which increases the probability to contract cardiovascular disease (CVD). They sampled data from Åbo (very Swedish speaking at that time), and North Karelia. The result showed that whereas 995 out of 10 000 people in North Karelia died from CVD, 300 out of 10 000 people met the same faith in Åbo. Note. They ate a similar diet (Teicholz, 2014).
-
In April of 2022, Helsingfors police department said that relational aggressiveness (Crick and Grotpeter, 1995; Hyde, 2005) among Finnish women is a huge issue. Finnish women typically speak uralic-finnish.
-
In May 2022, a director at the Finnish ministry of education and culture said that too many Finnish kids fail reading comprehension and numeracy. The latter is the precursor for instrumental and epistemic rational thinking.
-
In November 2022, at a conference about Children's rights, Finland's child commissary - Elina Pekkarinen - said that 20% of Finnish kids and young born 1997 or later, have mental issues. The prevalence is lower among the Swedish speaking Finns.
- In February 2023, a researcher from Helsingfors city said that Finns who speak Swedish have better health and live longer.
- In April 2023 KELA/FPA and THL reported that Finn's physical and mental health has deteriorated since 2010.
- In November 2023, at a conference about Children's rights, Finland's child commissary - Elina Pekkarinen - said that psychological violence (relational aggressiveness) and lethal violence against small children have increased. The host for the conference - Maj Estlander - interjected and said that 40% of the Finnish school kids have reported that they have been victims of psychological violence.
- high degree of neuroticism, which is typical for women, and manifested through aggressiveness and jealousy (Jiang, Dong och Wang, 2022; Ode et al. 2009; Weisberg et al. 2011). The explanation for neuroticism is both nature and nurture.
- Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD), manifested by a contradiction: fear of abandonment, yet paradoxically acting in ways that ensure they'll be abandoned (Ruffalo, 2024; Zalewski et al. 2014). The explanation for BPD may be Complex childhood trauma. See Dr. Shannon Curry's testimony/diagnosis of Amber Heard (Forensic Psychologist Dr. Shannon Curry Testifies (Trial Day 9)).
But here's the catch. In Finland, the sample taken in North Karelia for The Seven countries study became the North Karelia project. The sample from Åbo is forgotten (or maybe suppressed?). Together with Finland's Institute for Health and welfare (THL), the university of Helsingfors pride themselves of having convinced Finns to reduce their consumption of butter and salt. Butter because of the diet-heart hypothesis. Salt because it is said to elevate blood pressure.
In 1971, ~25 men and ~25 women died because of Alzheimer's, and that number was steady until 1980. Then the number of cases started to increase (link). < br />
 |
| Diagram from Statistics Finland. |
But the diet-heart hypothesis has been rejected on several occasions (Howard et al. 2006; Nutrition coalition, 2021,Ramsden et al. 2016; Teicholz, 2014). And decreasing the consumption of salt under one teaspoon per day, increases the probability to contract CVD (Mente, 2018; Mente et al. 2021). Research on the relation between salt consumption and Alzheimer's is inconclusive (Mohan et al. 2020). Daily consumption of sugary beverages and daily fruit juice was associated with lower total brain volume and poorer performance on tests of episodic memory (Pase et al. 2017).
In Finland, cake-day is very common. That means people in general seem to take the chance to celebrate as often as possible, drinking sparkling wine, and consuming multiple kinds of cakes. Cake-day is bad for physical and mental health (Hall et al. 2019; Lustig, 2017; Yudkin, 1972).
Finland is also very tribal from a socio-cultural point of view. That means you sustain tradition, reject information from the outside, and apply moral shaming (Pagel, 2019).
Conclusion. Finland is the global leader in Alzheimer's disease (AD), and people at lower age are contracting the disease. Despite having the same biology, environment, and socio-culture, AD is twice as prevalent i Finland compared to Sweden and also twice as common among women. Alzheimer's is associated s with sudden aggression, which is congruent to relational aggressiveness, typically a female phenomenon which is very common in Finland. 40% of school kids are affected. Why is AD so prevalent in Finland? The short answer: change in language which led to an increase of tribalism. The implication: sustaining false conclusions from North Karelia Project deprived Finns from eating butter, meat, and salt, and increased the consumption of sugar ultra-processed food, a 'lethal' combination for the brain (and the heart). It seems like Finnish women's relational aggressiveness is the precursor (marker) to Alzheimer's.
Please support the blog via Swish (Sweden) or MobilePay (Finland).
More about my expertise:
Executive coaching for CEOs/managers and workshops to facilitate Organizational Performance, Learning, and Creativity for Problem Solving | Lectures: Nutrition for physical and mental health | Course/lecture: children's emotional and social adjustment and cognitive development | Language training - Swedish | Academy Competency | CV | Teaching skills and experience | Summary of research project | Instagram | Linkedin | YouTube-channel | TikTok | Twitter
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