American pharmacist claim some members of US Congress suffer from Alzheimer’s disease

This photo taken on October 17, 2013 shows the US Capitol building before sunrise in Washington,DC. (By AFP)

An American pharmacist who fills prescriptions for members of Congress has claimed that some US lawmakers suffer from Alzheimer’s disease and “might not even remember what happened yesterday.”

In an interview with the health-oriented STAT News website, Mike Kim, the owner of Grubb's Pharmacy in Washington, DC, said he has prepared medication for members of the US Congress to treat conditions such as diabetes and Alzheimer’s disease.

“At first it’s cool, and then you realize, I’m filling some drugs that are for some pretty serious health problems as well. And these are the people that are running the country,” Kim said.

“It makes you kind of sit back and say, Wow, they’re making the highest laws of the land and they might not even remember what happened yesterday,” he added.

The news website also reported that Kim’s pharmacy was a 150-year-old DC drugstore that delivered as many as 100 prescriptions a day to the Capitol Hill, with some politicians coming in person to pick up their pills.

“I still remember John Kerry — it was literally like the day after he lost [the 2004 presidential election], he came in and he was just standing in line with everybody else,” Kim told STAT.

“I just remember seeing him standing in line and almost feeling sorry for him — one day he’s a superstar, he’s got his entourage and security detail, and the next day he’s just by himself, he’s picking up his prescription,” he noted.

Kerry was the US Secretary of State from 2013 to 2017 during the administration of former President Barack Obama. Prior to that, he represented the state of Massachusetts in the US Senate.

The disease is defined by the Alzheimer's Association as “a type of dementia that causes problems with memory, thinking and behavior.”

The association says the greatest known risk factor associated with the disease is increasing age, noting that the majority of people with Alzheimer's are at least 65 years old.

Although the average age for senators has been declining in recent years, the Congressional Research Service states that the current Congress is “among the oldest in US history.”

The average age in the House of Representatives is 57.8, and the average age in the Senate is 61.8, according to a profile of the current lawmakers done in December.

A new report by Alzheimer’s Disease Facts and Figures says the number of Americans living with Alzheimer’s disease is on the rise and some 5.5 million Americans are living with Alzheimer’s disease at present, including an estimated 200,000 under the age of 65.

Alzheimer’s is the sixth-leading cause of death in the United States and every 66 seconds, someone in the US develops dementia, the report said.