A step forward, but no miracle solution. By approving this week a treatment against Alzheimer’s disease, the American authorities have given an encouraging signal to relaunch research which has been sluggish for twenty years. But we are far from being able to cure the disease.
The American FDA Agency on Monday authorized a treatment for Alzheimer’s disease, called Aduhelm and developed by the American company Biogen. This is a first since 2003. And, even before, authorized treatments only responded to Alzheimer’s symptoms, not to the causes of the disease.
Biogen’s treatment seeks to destroy the plaques formed by certain proteins, called “amyloid”, in the brain of patients. By compressing neurons, they are one of the main factors in Alzheimer’s disease, which sees the patient irreparably lose his memory, and even his capacity for judgment.
This is “a pivotal moment in the search for revolutionary new treatments against Alzheimer’s disease,” said Hilary Evans, director of the British foundation Alzheimer’s Research, in a statement. Patients and their families finally have a concrete announcement after almost two decades of no new drug breakthroughs.
“This is a period during which we have made enormous progress in understanding the disease – how it manifests itself, why it manifests itself – and on its diagnosis”, especially at an early stage, put into perspective with (…)
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