This Article About "Reducing Risk of Dementia" Should Be Called ....

... how to avoid being tricked by clickbait headlines and skin deep science writers. Starting with the fact that in epidemiology the term "risk" doesn't mean anything about cause and effect, it means correlation. IOW, "risk factor" means "something highly associated with something else" which may or may not mean anything about cause and effect.

Cause and effect - you know, the thing that makes science cool. 

The "12" risks:

The review identified the biggest known risk factors for dementia as smoking, excess alcohol consumption, high blood pressure, obesity, diabetes, head injury, depression, hearing loss and exposure to air pollution, as well as lack of exercise, education and social contact.

Well, shoot, I have to take getting depressed out of my action plan! Not to mention avoiding hearing loss (I had a five-year plan to completely go deaf), and avoiding head injury (scheduled to get some of that next week, guess I have to cancel). 

Diabetes, hypertension and a large abdominal circumference (aka obesity) are all correlated with excess sugar (and carbohydrate in general) consumption - when you eliminate sugar you reduce all 3; 80% of hypertensives correct their BP with carb restriction, reduce blood sugar and reduce abdominal obesity.

There are plenty of reasons to believe that sugar intake is a primary driver of dementia - why didn't this writer just call that out?

The real action plan is to quite the "grettes", moderate booze and (eliminate) sugar intake, work out 2-3x per week with high intensity mixed modal activity, keep learning and engage with your fellow humans. 

So simple, but not easy.

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2250401-these-are-the-12-ways-you-can-drastically-cut-your-dementia-risk/#