Maltese-Australian contributes to Alzheimer's campaign

The song Think Ahead To Go Ahead, composed by Australian-Maltese musician Joseph Portelli, known as Jay P, has been chosen for Alzheimer's Australia's media campaign Mind Your Mind.

The campaign seeks to raise awareness about Alzheimer's, the most common form of dementia and a degenerative illness that includes loss of memory, intellect, rationality and social skill.

In Australia alone, over 227,000 people are diagnosed with dementia, including Jay P's father. This spurred the musician to compose the song How The Times Have Changed, in which he recounts how his father and his family were affected by the disease.

In July, he came up with Show Compassion, an event to raise funds in aid of dementia patients and their families and also to raise awareness about the condition, particularly among young people.

Deb Cutts, general manager for development and community relations at Alzheimer's Australia, said the aim of the forthcoming campaign was to raise awareness on ways to reduce the risk of developing dementia. Healthy lifestyle habits such as brain exercises along with physical activity can offer protection against dementia.