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After the flood: Exploring the link between disasters and dementia · The Morning Edition

• 0:04
  S1: When the murky and fast flowing waters surged into their
• 0:07
  S1: house in northern Victoria, Brian and Glynis Mulcahy were determined
• 0:12
  S1: they would save their home of more than 50 years.
• 0:15
  S1: In the end, they couldn't. But what they didn't know then,
• 0:18
  S1: during that devastating flood in 2022, was that the worst
• 0:22
  S1: was still to come. For Brian Mulcahy was never the
• 0:26
  S1: same again. The previously active man slid into a state
• 0:29
  S1: of listlessness and was later sent to a mental health facility.
• 0:34
  S1: I'm Samantha Selinger Morris, and you're listening to the Morning
• 0:37
  S1: Edition from the Age and The Sydney Morning Herald. Today,
• 0:41
  S1: regional Editor Benjamin Price on the link between dementia and
• 0:46
  S1: natural disasters. It's March the 30th. Welcome, Benjamin, back to
• 0:52
  S1: the podcast.
• 0:53
  S2: Thank you. It's great to be here again.
• 0:55
  S1: Well, I'm very looking forward to speaking to you about this.
• 0:57
  S1: To start, can you just tell us a little bit
• 1:00
  S1: about Brian and Glenn, whose home was inundated during a
• 1:04
  S1: catastrophic flood in Victoria in 2022. Who are they and
• 1:08
  S1: how did you meet them? Because it's quite an extraordinary story.
• 1:11
  S3: Yeah. So there are.
• 1:13
  S2: Really sort of lovely, friendly couple who I happen to
• 1:16
  S2: meet in probably one of the most unpleasant moments of
• 1:20
  S2: their life. We were covering the floods in Rochester in 2022.
• 1:29
  S2: Me and age photographer Justin McManus. We were some of
• 1:33
  S2: the only media there at the time who had stayed
• 1:35
  S2: to cover it, and we were waiting through probably knee
• 1:40
  S2: deep floodwater in the streets when we came across Brian
• 1:43
  S2: and a couple of other people, and he was pumping
• 1:46
  S2: water out of his front yard, and he'd set up
• 1:50
  S2: a kind of like a sandbag defence, and he was
• 1:54
  S2: essentially just trying to save his home from being flooded.
• 1:57
  S2: And we asked if we could hang around and they said, yeah,
• 2:00
  S2: that's fine. Just you can stay and watch. And yeah, we,
• 2:05
  S2: we just sort of were the just observers of this
• 2:09
  S2: natural disaster unfolding quite slowly in, in real time.
• 2:20
  S4: Good morning. We start with an urgent weather alert with
• 2:22
  S4: a severe storm warning issued for most of Victoria and
• 2:25
  S4: towns now on alert for a 1 in 50 year flood.
• 2:28
  S4: Incredibly nervous time. And this is what is happening here
• 2:30
  S4: right now. All these teams are here preparing these sandbags.
• 2:34
  S4: Everyone in the community is trying to help out. There
• 2:37
  S4: are locals here. There are people who've come from Melbourne.
• 2:40
  S4: The town of Rochester in the state's north, is one
• 2:43
  S4: of those in the firing line. As the Campaspe River rises.
• 2:47
  S5: More than a thousand properties in Rochester have been swamped,
• 2:50
  S5: with water levels set to exceed the catastrophic floods in 2011.
• 2:55
  S5: The town is now cut off from the rest of
• 2:57
  S5: the state, with residents told it is too late to leave.
• 3:04
  S2: After a while, it became quite clear that they were
• 3:07
  S2: not going to be able to pump their way out
• 3:09
  S2: of out of this disaster, and the water was probably
• 3:12
  S2: going to come inside their house. It had come inside
• 3:15
  S2: their house once before in 2011. That was a less
• 3:18
  S2: severe flood in 2011.
• 3:21
  S6: We had six inches in and in 2022 we had
• 3:26
  S6: ten inches in.
• 3:28
  S2: Yeah. And yeah, obviously 2022 was when. Yeah, me and
• 3:31
  S2: Justin were here.
• 3:33
  S6: Yeah, yeah yeah. Helping us. Yeah. That's right.
• 3:38
  S2: Yeah. So they knew that their house was vulnerable and
• 3:42
  S2: we went inside with them and they were actually they
• 3:45
  S2: were just so friendly and generous. And Glennis was smiling
• 3:50
  S2: the whole time because she's a very sort of cheery,
• 3:52
  S2: smiley person. Even though it was so unpleasant, she kept
• 3:56
  S2: apologizing that she couldn't feed us and give us a
• 3:59
  S2: cup of tea. And after a while, we just started
• 4:04
  S2: helping to lift the furniture, and we lifted some of
• 4:08
  S2: the appliances and things like that. Because, you know, like
• 4:11
  S2: Justin and I are both quite a bit younger than
• 4:15
  S2: than Brian and Glennis. And then, yeah, we just sort
• 4:17
  S2: of watched the, the water come inside. And there is
• 4:21
  S2: a few things that really stick in my mind. I
• 4:24
  S2: remember standing on the balcony of their, um, the veranda
• 4:28
  S2: rather of their home and just watching spiders crawling up
• 4:32
  S2: the walls. They'd abandoned their homes too. And I remember
• 4:37
  S2: just like being in inside the house and I could
• 4:40
  S2: hear the, um, I could hear a bubbling. And it
• 4:43
  S2: was just like water started coming up through the toilet.
• 4:46
  S2: And then the water just started coming in sort of
• 4:48
  S2: from everywhere. And it was just sort of this slow,
• 4:53
  S2: slow march of the water, but it was clear that
• 4:56
  S2: it was just going to keep coming. And after a while,
• 4:59
  S2: Justin and I had to leave and continue with our
• 5:03
  S2: work and we had to go and file our stories.
• 5:06
  S2: So we left them there, but we kept in touch.
• 5:10
  S1: I mean, it sounds honestly, it sounds like a horror movie.
• 5:12
  S1: And I mean, as you've written, the floodwater, it reached
• 5:15
  S1: ten inches above floor level in their house. And Brian
• 5:19
  S1: and Glennis, they moved to a caravan about 20 minutes away, right.
• 5:23
  S1: While they were waiting for repairs to their home. That
• 5:25
  S1: was caused by the damage of this flood. And it
• 5:28
  S1: was at that point that Glennis realized that her husband, Brian,
• 5:31
  S1: just wasn't coping. So tell us what happened next.
• 5:35
  S2: Yeah, well, so I kept checking in with Glennis afterwards
• 5:40
  S2: and she would often tell me that yeah, they they've
• 5:43
  S2: been having a bit of a hard time and Brian
• 5:45
  S2: in particular had been struggling. He lost a fair bit
• 5:48
  S2: of motivation and, and things like that. And it seemed
• 5:50
  S2: like he wasn't really getting that much enjoyment from the
• 5:53
  S2: things that he really used to. um, he used to
• 5:56
  S2: love that would play out more afterwards as well. And
• 6:00
  S2: then yeah, she just sort of kept me updated and
• 6:03
  S2: said that, you know, he'd had to go to hospital
• 6:06
  S2: after he um, he had a bit of a collapse.
• 6:09
  S6: It's all started. He was down in the caravan and, um,
• 6:12
  S6: he couldn't sleep. And one morning he got up and
• 6:15
  S6: he collapsed and I rang triple. Oh. And the ambos
• 6:19
  S6: come around and they said, well, he hasn't had a
• 6:21
  S6: heart attack or a stroke or that. And they took
• 6:24
  S6: him up to um Echuca Hospital and.
• 6:27
  S2: That he'd spent some time in a mental health facility
• 6:30
  S2: and then ultimately later that he had been diagnosed with dementia.
• 6:34
  S6: Just deteriorated from there. And they suggested that we have
• 6:39
  S6: a scan on his brain. And that's when they found
• 6:43
  S6: out he had dementia.
• 6:44
  S7: And it was pretty.
• 6:45
  S1: Shocking, right? Because he collapses. This is just, I think
• 6:48
  S1: a few days after the flood, like you said, he
• 6:51
  S1: wasn't himself. And then one day he just gives out.
• 6:54
  S1: She rings 000. The paramedics arrive and I think she
• 6:57
  S1: was quite surprised when she was eventually told that actually
• 7:01
  S1: he hadn't suffered a heart attack or a stroke. Like
• 7:03
  S1: that's maybe what she thought originally, right?
• 7:06
  S2: Well, that would have been, I guess, an obvious concern
• 7:11
  S2: or conclusion to make in the stress of the moment.
• 7:16
  S2: I probably would have assumed the same thing. So yeah,
• 7:20
  S2: I think for me it would come as a surprise
• 7:23
  S2: to get that kind of news that it's just a
• 7:25
  S2: collapse rather than some kind of life threatening moment.
• 7:33
  S1: And this is, I think, where your story takes perhaps
• 7:35
  S1: an even more unexpected or extraordinary turn, because Glenn has
• 7:39
  S1: told you that she believes that the flood actually triggered
• 7:43
  S1: the brain condition. You know, like you said, he'd been
• 7:45
  S1: diagnosed with dementia. And then through your maintaining your connection
• 7:49
  S1: with you actually came across a common thread that people
• 7:52
  S1: had been suffering as a result of the flood. And
• 7:54
  S1: it wasn't just a coincidence, right? Like you found other
• 7:57
  S1: people that had been suffering after this flood.
• 8:01
  S2: Yeah. That's right. So I went to Brian's funeral a
• 8:05
  S2: few weeks ago, and I got to talking to people afterwards,
• 8:10
  S2: and it was a bit of a common theme that
• 8:13
  S2: emerged that some of the older people in the community
• 8:15
  S2: had really struggled afterwards. That flood hit the community broadly,
• 8:19
  S2: really quite hard. There were fewer people who were able
• 8:24
  S2: to help their neighbours because so many were struggling themselves. Still,
• 8:30
  S2: there was a huge effort of support. It was really
• 8:33
  S2: quite inspiring, and I think that the way that that
• 8:37
  S2: community is handled itself in some ways has been really
• 8:41
  S2: quite impressive to me. But this impact on older people
• 8:47
  S2: for me was quite striking. It was a common theme.
• 8:50
  S2: A lot of people mentioned it to me the more
• 8:52
  S2: phone calls I made afterwards, the more people had similar stories.
• 8:59
  S2: And I found out as well that the science, the
• 9:02
  S2: research does have something to say about this.
• 9:11
  S1: After the break.
• 9:12
  S2: Communities around Australia are suffering almost at any time of
• 9:16
  S2: the year from natural disaster, and the people I've spoken
• 9:20
  S2: to are saying, this really needs to be part of
• 9:22
  S2: our emergency response.
• 9:35
  S1: I mean, this is incredible because specifically the people you'd
• 9:37
  S1: spoken to after this flood in this community, multiple people
• 9:40
  S1: said that a parent or someone close to them had
• 9:43
  S1: suffered significant cognitive decline or been diagnosed with dementia after
• 9:47
  S1: the floods. Now, this is definitely a connection that, you know,
• 9:50
  S1: totally new to me. I'd never heard about this. But
• 9:52
  S1: tell us about the research that you discovered that suggests
• 9:55
  S1: that there might be some scientific basis to this connection.
• 9:58
  S2: That's right. Yeah. And I think we need to be
• 10:01
  S2: careful about how we think about a connection here. The
• 10:06
  S2: research that I've read, or one of the studies suggested
• 10:10
  S2: that there is an increased risk of dementia after a flood.
• 10:14
  S2: Other experts I've spoken to have mentioned things like, it's
• 10:19
  S2: possible that there was a pre-existing condition there and a
• 10:23
  S2: flood unmasked, that in regional areas, people don't have as
• 10:29
  S2: much access to health facilities and health resources. Experts think
• 10:37
  S2: that there's a lot of undiagnosed dementia in the community broadly,
• 10:42
  S2: so it's possible that the flood has unmasked some of
• 10:45
  S2: these things or floods do that in general. Perhaps natural
• 10:49
  S2: disasters do that in general, Two. But the other thing
• 10:52
  S2: about floods is that there's a whole lot of factors
• 10:55
  S2: involved in floods that are particularly unhealthy and can be
• 11:02
  S2: really problematic for somebody who is vulnerable to a condition
• 11:08
  S2: like dementia, I would imagine perhaps already has symptoms of dementia.
• 11:13
  S2: You know, these are things like the stress that continues
• 11:17
  S2: for a long period of time. There can be a
• 11:18
  S2: long build up with floods beforehand and a long period
• 11:22
  S2: of uncertainty when it's actually happening about whether your house
• 11:26
  S2: is going to be impacted or not. Once it is,
• 11:29
  S2: takes a long time often to get, you know, tradespeople
• 11:32
  S2: in assesses deal with insurance companies. These things are stressful
• 11:37
  S2: under normal circumstances. But in the flood, you've got this
• 11:39
  S2: long tail of stress that's bad. That's that's bad for
• 11:44
  S2: our health. There's also a massive disruption to routine. You
• 11:50
  S2: don't have the same. You don't have the same house,
• 11:53
  S2: so you don't have the same. You know, the same
• 11:55
  S2: sort of like routine and the, you know, just the
• 11:58
  S2: ability to walk through your house almost with your eyes
• 12:00
  S2: closed and know where things are. You know, it's, it's
• 12:04
  S2: harder to get access to fresh fruit and vegetables in
• 12:07
  S2: a flood. These are all unhealthy things that can contribute
• 12:10
  S2: to chronic disease.
• 12:11
  S7: You mentioned just before that.
• 12:13
  S1: A flood can unmask a preexisting condition. So can you
• 12:16
  S1: walk us through that a little bit? How can it
• 12:17
  S1: do that?
• 12:18
  S2: Well, I think that from some of the experts I've
• 12:21
  S2: spoken to, I mean, I was just on the phone
• 12:24
  S2: earlier to a geriatrician called Kate Grigorovitch, and she was
• 12:28
  S2: saying that you've got to be careful about whether we
• 12:31
  S2: treat one thing as causing the other. But if somebody
• 12:36
  S2: is already dealing with dementia or in the early stages
• 12:40
  S2: of dementia, if somebody is already in the early stages
• 12:43
  S2: of dementia, then the fallout from a flood, the social dislocation,
• 12:49
  S2: the disruptions to routine, all of those things that can
• 12:53
  S2: perhaps shine a light on symptoms that were not that
• 12:57
  S2: obvious beforehand. The other thing is that she was saying that,
• 13:00
  S2: you know, when somebody in the early stages of dementia
• 13:04
  S2: or undiagnosed dementia experiences a life changing event, like, say,
• 13:10
  S2: a man with early stage dementia who experiences the loss
• 13:14
  S2: of a partner, there might have been things beforehand that
• 13:19
  S2: masked those dementia symptoms. For example, if the wife was
• 13:24
  S2: the one that did all of the, you know, the
• 13:26
  S2: social organizing, and then all of a sudden she's not
• 13:30
  S2: there to do that, then that can unmask a situation
• 13:36
  S2: where this person is really lonely and it's bad for
• 13:39
  S2: their health.
• 13:40
  S1: Right? Okay. And so you mentioned a 2025 study just
• 13:44
  S1: earlier led by researchers from Monash University and China that drew,
• 13:48
  S1: like you said, this link between flooding and increased dimension risk.
• 13:52
  S1: So not necessarily a straight causational link, but a link.
• 13:56
  S1: But this study just wasn't conducted in Australia, right? There
• 13:58
  S1: was actually evidence from disasters around the world as well
• 14:01
  S1: that sort of makes this link.
• 14:03
  S2: So this study analyzed a large amount of data from
• 14:07
  S2: the UK. And I guess in the UK they don't
• 14:11
  S2: have the same bushfire problem as as we do here.
• 14:14
  S2: So I guess that's why they, um, they focused on flood.
• 14:18
  S2: But the study, as research often does is it cites
• 14:22
  S2: other research as well. And so they cited some studies,
• 14:25
  S2: particularly in Japan, that showed that dementia medication rose after
• 14:30
  S2: a flood. And I think that it's worth us looking
• 14:34
  S2: into more and that the researchers should spend more time
• 14:37
  S2: looking into it. And the experts I've spoken to are
• 14:41
  S2: also saying that authorities in Australia need to be more
• 14:46
  S2: aware of how people are struggling after a natural disaster,
• 14:51
  S2: after a flood, and that people experienced in identifying symptoms
• 14:57
  S2: of conditions like dementia should be out there on the
• 15:01
  S2: ground during and after natural disasters.
• 15:05
  S1: And one expert that you spoke to mentioned that she
• 15:08
  S1: believes that dementia actually remains undiagnosed among many people, as
• 15:13
  S1: its symptoms are often mistaken as a normal part of aging.
• 15:16
  S1: So does that mean that for a lot of people,
• 15:19
  S1: perhaps even in Rochester, where you met Brian, that they
• 15:22
  S1: could be suffering from a decline and just not realize
• 15:25
  S1: it like he did?
• 15:26
  S2: Well, I guess it is possible that more people are
• 15:31
  S2: suffering from the early stages of dementia and and not
• 15:35
  S2: know about it, especially, like we were saying earlier, especially
• 15:39
  S2: in regional areas where people don't have as much access to,
• 15:46
  S2: to health services. I think that it probably stands to
• 15:49
  S2: reason that if they can't get access to diagnoses as easily,
• 15:54
  S2: then there's a good chance that people are suffering in
• 15:58
  S2: a way that's not really recognized. But this does seem
• 16:02
  S2: to be a problem more broadly. So the top ten
• 16:05
  S2: places for dementia diagnoses that I found in a story
• 16:10
  S2: that my colleagues, Henrietta Cooke and Ayesha Dow, did a
• 16:13
  S2: couple of years ago, the top ten places for dementia
• 16:16
  S2: were not in regional Victoria. They were in Melbourne, but
• 16:20
  S2: I don't know exactly how to account for that. There
• 16:22
  S2: could be a whole lot of reasons for that greater
• 16:25
  S2: population density or whatever the case may be.
• 16:27
  S7: And so what more do.
• 16:28
  S1: Researchers hope change in this space about how vulnerable people
• 16:32
  S1: in our communities do need support when either preparing for
• 16:35
  S1: disaster or, as in the case of Brian and Glennis,
• 16:39
  S1: after they've experienced one?
• 16:41
  S2: Well, I think just a greater awareness is the first
• 16:44
  S2: thing that. this is something that needs to be part
• 16:47
  S2: of the emergency response. Given that we're such a natural
• 16:52
  S2: disaster prone country that, you know, communities around Australia are
• 16:57
  S2: suffering almost at any time of the year from natural disaster.
• 17:01
  S2: And the people I've spoken to are saying, this really
• 17:04
  S2: needs to be part of our emergency response. We need
• 17:08
  S2: to have people who are trained in recognizing the symptoms
• 17:12
  S2: and the ways in which people might be struggling, and
• 17:15
  S2: how do we I don't know about preventing it, but
• 17:17
  S2: how do we make their lives better for them? How
• 17:19
  S2: do we help them get back on their feet? How
• 17:21
  S2: do we get people living a more healthy lifestyle and
• 17:25
  S2: enjoying their golden years? Because that was one thing that
• 17:28
  S2: people spoke to me about repeatedly in Rochester was that
• 17:31
  S2: they feel like there's a group of people who have
• 17:33
  S2: been denied their golden years, denied the chance to enjoy
• 17:38
  S2: those moments in retirement and really be full functioning, you know,
• 17:45
  S2: important parts of the community as they are. Like they
• 17:48
  S2: spoke a lot about the importance of their of their
• 17:50
  S2: elders and the knowledge that they embody and all of
• 17:53
  S2: those things. And I think that it's really hard on
• 17:58
  S2: a town like Rochester, which already skews older, to have
• 18:02
  S2: so many people struggling after a flood. We need to
• 18:06
  S2: be thinking about this stuff into the future, because climate
• 18:09
  S2: change is only going to make it more challenging.
• 18:12
  S1: And so, Benjamin, just to wrap up, you know, for
• 18:14
  S1: people who are listening, who might be thinking about their
• 18:16
  S1: parents or their grandparents, and particularly after, you know, we've
• 18:19
  S1: had bushfires and lived through the pandemic and other natural disasters,
• 18:23
  S1: what are some of the signs that they should perhaps
• 18:26
  S1: look out for that they might think are signs of aging,
• 18:29
  S1: but they could actually be signs of early undiagnosed dementia
• 18:33
  S1: or other conditions?
• 18:35
  S2: One thing that Doctor Kate Grigorovitch mentioned to me was
• 18:39
  S2: that apathy is one of those things that people don't
• 18:43
  S2: realize may be a symptom of dementia. So she said
• 18:47
  S2: to me, it's probably the most common first symptom. So
• 18:51
  S2: I guess if you realize that a loved one is
• 18:56
  S2: not excited or interested in the things that used to
• 18:59
  S2: interest them, then maybe it's worth starting to dig a
• 19:03
  S2: little bit deeper into that.
• 19:07
  S1: That is such good insight. Thank you so much, Benjamin,
• 19:10
  S1: for your time.
• 19:11
  S2: Thank you so much. It's great to be with you again.
• 19:20
  S1: Today's episode was produced by Josh towers. Our executive producer
• 19:25
  S1: is Tammy Mills, and our podcasts are overseen by Lisa
• 19:28
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