Dementia is a disease we associate with old age. Most people are unaware that children can also suffer from dementia. Around 700 children in Germany and about 70,000 children worldwide suffer from the incurable and fatal neuronal ceroid lipofuscinosis (NCL), better known as childhood dementia. In the juvenile form of childhood dementia, known as CLN3, children begin to lose their eyesight in elementary school, until they are completely blind within one to three years. Previously learned skills are forgotten, and cognitive and motor abilities progressively decline in a creeping process. In addition to losing speech and the ability to move independently, children are plagued by epileptic seizures until they succumb to the disease between the ages of 25 and 30.