Re: 25,000 per Congressional District in our PD Community?

[Phil Tompkins <philtomp@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Ivan M Suzman wrote:

> If a March, 1998, APDA-derived estimate of 3500 PWP's per
> Congressional District, that my State Senator obtained for use in
> the Maine Parkinson's Awareness Resolution, is close to accurate;

Well, there are 435 Congressional districts in the U.S.   435 X 3500
= roughly the 1.5 million number, which is I think the high end of
some very roughly guesstimated range of numbers.

This range probably includes a v-e-r-y rough large number of
undiagnosed and pre-symptomatic PWPs, and perhaps people with some
forms of non-idiopathic Parkinsonism as well.  It would be nice if
we were given a breakdown of this estimated total PWP's in terms
of what goes into it, an indication of how accurate it is, and the
method by which it was determined.  These components are as
important as the final number itself in terms of understandig what
it means, but they get dropped.

BTW, does anyone know how many PWP's there are in their
Congressional district, and what proportion this is of the total
district population?

> and if there are 6 or 7 people  either in the immediate family or >
> who are close friends, who are each PWP's caregivers;
>
> then there are 25,000 or so persons (PWP's + CG's) DIRECTLY affected
> by PD in each District, on a daily basis!

25,000 is high. Nobody is impacted by pre-symptomatic PD in the
sense that they experience anything or incur a financial cost.
Although people who are pre-symtomatic can certainly be said to have
PD, how do you count them?

Phil Tompkins
Hoboken NJ
60/9