https://theconversation.com/dementia-at-just-24-years-old-how-britains-youngest-sufferer-may-help-researchers-understand-the-disease-272972

Dementia at just 24-years-old – how Britain’s youngest sufferer may help researchers understand the disease

Published: January 9, 2026 11:44am EST

Rahul Sidhu, University of Sheffield

A UK man who is thought to be Britain’s youngest dementia sufferer recently passed away from the disease at only 24 years old. Andre Yarham, from Norfolk in England, was just 22 when he was first diagnosed with dementia.

At the age of 24, most brains are still settling into adulthood. But Yarham’s brain looked decades older — resembling the brain of a 70-year-old, according to the MRI scan that helped diagnose him with the disease.

Yarham initially began exhibiting symptoms of dementia in 2022, with family saying he had become increasingly forgetful and would sometimes have a blank expression on his face.

In the final stages of his life, he lost his speech, could no longer care for himself, behaved “inappropriately” and was bound to his wheelchair.

Dementia is usually associated with old age. However, some forms of dementia can strike astonishingly early and move frighteningly fast. Take frontotemporal dementia, for instance. This was the form of dementia that Yarham was diagnosed with.

Unlike Alzheimer’s disease, which tends to affect memory first, frontotemporal dementia attacks the parts of the brain involved in personality, behaviour and language. These regions sit behind the forehead and above the ears in the frontal and temporal lobes.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5821457&forum_id=2.#49585723)