FORT MYERS, Fla. \u2014 Hundreds of people walked across Florida SouthWestern’s campus on Saturday to raise money for Alzheimer’s research. <\/p>\n
For some, the walk was personal. <\/p>\n
John Edwards said his wife, Bunny, suffers from Alzheimer’s. It’s a type of dementia that gets worse over time, according to the Alzheimer’s Association. People can have memory loss and struggle to hold a conversation. <\/p>\n
WATCH: John Edwards shares his wife’s journey with Alzheimer’s: <\/p>\n
‘It gives you hope:’ Hundreds walk to end Alzheimer’s in Southwest Florida<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s like, okay, here\u2019s a person and then they don\u2019t remember you. And then what do you do from there?,” Edwards said. “So there\u2019s a lot of stress. A lot of energy. A lot of work. But there\u2019s hope. That\u2019s what you gotta go with.\u201d<\/p>\n
500 people registered for Saturday’s event according to Irene Montagnino, executive chair of the walk. The Alzheimer’s Assocation is an Illinois-based nonprofit that supports Alzheimer’s research and awareness. The group hosts walks like this around the country. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
WFTX<\/p>\n
John Edwards speaks with FOX 4 on Florida SouthWestern State College’s campus in Fort Myers, Fla. on Saturday, Nov. 8, 2025. Edwards said his wife has Alzheimer’s. <\/p>\n
The Lee County walk raised more than $120,000 this year, according to a spokesperson. The goal is to raise $160,000, Montagnino said. She said Alzheimer’s is a big issue in Florida.<\/p>\n
Alzheimer’s symptoms tend to appear in people aged 65 years and older, according to the National Institutes of Health.<\/a> <\/p>\n In 2023, more than 580,000 Floridians have Alzheimer\u2019s, according to University of Florida Health.<\/a> One study published last year<\/a> said Florida has the second-highest number of people with Alzheimer’s in the country. <\/p>\n The Alzheimer’s Association said there is no cure for the disease, although medication can help. On Saturday, people worked to change that one step at a time. <\/p>\n \u201cWe want the cure,” Montagnino said. “That\u2019s why we hope. We hope for the cure.\u201d <\/p>\n WFTX<\/p>\n People walk to raise money for Alzheimer’s research in Fort Myers, Fla. on Saturday, Nov. 8, 2025. <\/p>\n Several groups donated money, including the Neuropsychiatric Research Center of Southwest Florida. The center conducts clinical studies, according to its website. John Huffaker and his daughter Darian work there. They both participated in the walk. <\/p>\n Right now, the center is running about 20 Alzheimer’s and cognitive impairment disease studies, John said. <\/p>\n \u201cWe have a ton of patients that we work with at the research center who are obviously suffering from a very terrible disease,\u201d Darian said. \u201cSo we like to get out here and show that we support them and we\u2019re going to be doing whatever we can to hopefully find a way, to hopefully find a cure for the disease.\u201d<\/p>\n Before the walk, people held up plastic flowers in solidarity with Alzheimer’s patients and their caretakers. <\/p>\n \u201cIt gives you hope, it gives you resources,” Edwards said. “And hopefully it\u2019ll give a cure, somewhere down the road.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FORT MYERS, Fla. \u2014 Hundreds of people walked across Florida SouthWestern’s campus on Saturday to raise money for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":39096,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[10017,26478,209,211,210,14455,11953,899,17596,356],"class_list":["post-39095","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cape-coral","tag-alzheimers","tag-alzheimers-association","tag-cape-coral","tag-cape-coral-headlines","tag-cape-coral-news","tag-clinical-studies","tag-florida-southwestern-state-college","tag-fort-myers-metro-south-florida","tag-fsw","tag-lee-county"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39095","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39095"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39095\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39096"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39095"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39095"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39095"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/p>\n