Dementia timebomb: Aging Japan faces healthcare crisis... Kanemasa Ito compares caring for his wife Kimiko to waging a daily war with the devil. The woman he loved has all but disappeared -- lost to dementia, she can no longer eat, bathe, or go to the toilet alone. "There is a demon inside her head," Ito told AFP, articulating the dramatic change in the person he'd built a life with, while she babbles nonsensically. One of the world's most rapidly ageing and long-lived societies, Japan is at the forefront of an impending global healthcare crisis. Authorities are bracing for a dementia timebomb and their approach could shape policies well beyond its borders. By 2025, one in five of the over 65s -- around 7.3 million people -- in Japan will have dementia, the health ministry estimates, up from around 4.6 million now. Alzheimer's Disease, a syndrome in which cognitive ability, emotional control, and social behaviour deteriorate, accounts for the majority of cases. Ito's wife was just 54 when she was first diagnosed. Now some 15 years on, he is close to breaking point trying to care for her and manage the disease. No longer able to discern what is harmful from what is safe -- Kim
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