In the UK – this post is mainly for UK readers – journalists and opinion leaders are currently falling over themselves reporting about a major breakthrough: an Alzheimer’s drug has been shown to slow the disease by around 36%. “After 20 years with no new Alzheimer’s disease drugs in the UK, we now have two potential new drugs in 12 just months,” wrote Dr Richard Oakley, associate director at the Alzheimer’s Society. And the Daily Mail headlined: “New drug which claims to slow mental decline caused by Alzheimer’s by 36% could spell ‘the beginning of the end’ for the degenerative brain disease”.
That’s excellent news!
Many people will have made a sigh of relief!
So, why does it make me angry?
Once we listen to the news more closely we learn that:
- the drug only works for patients who are diagnosed early;
- for an early diagnosis, we need a PET scan;
- the UK hardly has any PET scanners, in fact, we have the lowest number among developed countries;
- these scanners are very expensive;
- the costs for the new drug are as yet unknown but will also be high.
Collectively these facts mean that we have a major advance in healthcare that could help many patients. At the same time, we all know that this is mere theory and that the practice will be very different.
Why?
- Because the NHS has been run down and is on its knees.
- Because our government will again say that they have invested xy millions into this area.
- The statement might be true or not, but in any case, the funds will be far too little.
- The UK has become a country where some patients suffering from severe toothache currently resort to pulling out their own teeth at home with pairs of pliers.
- In the foreseeable future, the NHS will not be allocated the money to invest in sufficient numbers of PET scans (not to mention the funds to buy the new and expensive drug).
In other words, the UK celebrates yet another medical advance raising many people’s expectations, while everyone in the know is well aware of the fact that the UK public will not benefit from it.
Does that not make you angry too?
21 Responses to Angry thoughts about the new Alzheimer drug
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I agree. Have you worked out the absolute numbers as in number need to treat to control progression for >12 months?
We saw the same headlines in 1971 about a cure for cancer and this is a more difficult problem.
Is JAMA really that effective? Aduhelm (Aducanumab) was also once considered a beacon of hope in the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease and was approved by the FDA in 2021 despite very moderate results in clinical trials. Barely one year later, Biogen had to withdrawn the drug. The medical benefit of Aduhelm had not been proven after all, and taking it was also associated with serious health risks.
JAMA (Journal of the American Medical Association) is a journal, not a treatment. The new Alzheimer’s treatment is Donanemab.
Oh, my mistake. Thank you for the notice.
BBC Report July 2023:
… “A new drug, donanemab, is being hailed as a turning point in the fight against Alzheimer’s, after a global trial confirms it slows cognitive decline.
The antibody medicine helps in the early stages of the disease by clearing a protein that builds up in the brains of people with this type of dementia.
The drug works in Alzheimer’s disease, not in other types of dementia, such as vascular dementia.
In the trials, it appears to have slowed the pace of the disease by about a third.
Although extremely promising, these drugs are not risk-free treatments. Brain swelling was a common side-effect in up to a third of patients in the donanemab trial. For most, this resolved without causing symptoms. However, two volunteers, and possibly a third, died as a result of dangerous swelling in the brain”.
Could ‘SCAM’ be useful?
While these new drugs are being studied, perhaps more attention should be paid to healthy diet and lifestyle choices. Omega fatty acids might be a useful life-long strategy for those who are yet to suffer dementia and other brain related illnesses.
Simple dietary intervention could amount to billions in health care cost savings! Alzheimer’s disease is the most common cause of dementia in older adults and the 7th leading cause of death in the United States according to the National Institute on Aging. It is a debilitating progressive illness that slowly destroys cognitive function and memory.
Research has found certain genes increase the risk of developing dementia. In particular, the apolipoprotein E gene called APOE4 is the strongest risk factor gene for Alzheimer’s disease.
New research published in the journal Nutrients shows that people with a higher blood DHA level are 49% less likely to develop Alzheimer’s disease vs. those with lower levels, according to the Fatty Acid Research Institute (FARI). The study, led by Aleix Sala-Vila, PhD, suggested that providing extra dietary omega-3 DHA, especially for those carrying the ApoE4 gene (which approximately doubles an individual’s susceptibility to develop AD) might slow the development of the disease. Such a cost-effective, low-risk dietary intervention like this could potentially save billions in health care costs.
In this prospective observational study conducted within the Framingham Offspring Cohort including 1490 dementia-free participants, researchers examined the association of red blood cell (RBC) docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) with incident Alzheimer’s Disease (AD), while also testing for an interaction with APOE-e4 carriership.
BRAIN HEALTH:
There are many published studies – just one I selected at random below – that demonstrate a link between certain nutrients-from-nature (NFN) and brain health. SCAM critics often claim that targeted nutrients cannot treat or cure specific illnesses. It is true that some of poorly designed studies fail to prove (for example) that Vitamin D administered in isolation can successfully treat an existing ailment. But should we instead focus more on PREVENTION?
If levels of certain vitamins, minerals, amino acids and fatty acids remain low for too long in a human body, then disease can take hold more easily than if those nutrients were maintained at higher levels during a person’s lifetime. In my opinion it’s just common sense.
As this thread is concerned with the latest dementia drug trial, I commend this paper to you:
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25877495/
Could ‘SCAM’ be useful?
No
…perhaps more attention should be paid to healthy diet and lifestyle choices.
Yes, by all means, lets blame the patients without even knowing what “diet or lifestyle” any of them have had.
Omega fatty acids might be a useful life-long strategy for those who are yet to suffer dementia and other brain related illnesses.
Actual evidence please
…prospective observational study
Pretty thin gruel for making actual treatment recommendations.
So many times it all comes back to sugar.
https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/whats-the-relationship-between-diabetes-and-dementia-202107122546
That is hardly news. It is general knowledge by now. I doubt anyone here would argue otherwise. Here is what CDC has to say about that:
https://www.cdc.gov/nutrition/data-statistics/be-sugar-smart.html
https://www.cdc.gov/diabetes/library/features/diabetes-and-your-brain.html
Not many people are arguing, no.
However, not many people are following. If it were so that the population is HEARING the message, the standard American diet would not be so carb and sugar heavy, and so many would not be increasing in insulin resistance. The same goes for many countries of the world. Diabetes is growing a growing disease in almost every country of the world.
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2021/11/diabetes-burdens-rising-health-global/
It’s not good enough just to HEAR the message.
@John a.k.a RG
You sound like someone who would happily force people to bend to your will, because you know what is good for them. What would you do to make people follow or would you lobby the government do your bidding? Should the government force people to eat less sugar? Should companies selling sugary products be censored and prevented from advertising? Should the government jail people for eating too much sugar?
Despite all the public health messaging, there is a lot of demand for sugary products. Like how you are free to choose ineffective SCAM over medicine, I am free to eat sugary foods, as a result if I suffer from diabetes that is my prerogative. After all, I am living in a free country. You can’t make me do anything against my will.
You read in too much, don’t put words in my mouth.
I have never lobbied for any government agency to force anybody to eat anything specifically, in fact the opposite. I perceive the I value freedom to choose more than you, so don’t make a silly assumption about me. I simply desire the world to see the correlation between diet and health.
I WOULD be in favor of the government NOT adding to the health problem by encouraging the population to eat more “cereals and grains”…. as occurred recently.
https://interestingengineering.com/health/the-fdas-new-healthy-foods-guidance-means-you-can-finally-eat-more-cereal
BTW- The demand for sugary products was never as high before the public was lied to about fats and encouraged to eat more sugar. Talk about a SCAM !
https://nucific.com/harvard-scientists-sugar/
@John a.k.a RG
LOL, your typical hand-waving and petulant whining aside, you didn’t really answer my question.
You implied that despite messaging that sugar is bad, people are not acting. So, I ask again, what would you do to make people follow?
You said.
“You implied that despite messaging that sugar is bad, people are not acting. So, I ask again, what would you do to make people follow?
I already answered that question…. I don’t want to make anybody do something against their will. I told you one of my problems is with dis-information from the government encouraging people to eat sugar rather than fats.
A question for you.
Despite messaging that covid vaccines are safe and effective, much of the population still doesn’t want to participate in the jabs.
“so I ask you” … do you still want to MAKE people follow ?
@John a.k.a RG
Got it. There is nothing you can do about it except bitch and whine. 🤣
I am very doubtful about your ability to recognize disinformation.
Don’t try to change the subject to vaccines, buster.
Back to at least 1972 in the book: Pure, White and Deadly by John Yudkin:
https://archive.org/details/purewhiteanddeadlybyjohnyudkin1972
The NHS has not been run down. The reason it is on it’s knees is because unlike other countries whose health service far outperform, it is state run.
1) some other countries’ heathcare systems are also state run.
2) the NHS has been state-run since 1948 and has become rund down only in recent years.
Not been paying attention since 2010 and “austerity” cut budgets and staffing levels? Hint: that’s how my job disappeared and our service was cut to ribbons, all while we were expected to do more because of cuts to non-NHS services, also due to “austerity”.
Never heard of the enforced “efficiency” savings, which have been in place for a couple of decades? Or how about the return on capital all triusts had to make after the imposition of the purchaser/supplier split by Thatcher?
Never heard of the deliberate decisions taken to reduce the numbers of medical and nursing training places in the early 2010s?
Never read the books by certain Secretaries of State for Health, describing exactly how they would run down the NHS and sell it off? Nor the Lib Dems’ Orange Book in which they describe how to reduce government spending on the NHS and other state provision?
Being run by the state is only relevant as it it is governments who have decided to screw over the NHS by making some very clear and well-documented political decisions designed entirely to run it down. This has been well-documented in this country over the years and is well-known to those of us who worked in the NHS from the late 80s on.
The assumption that state-run health systems are crap is wrong. For example, take a look to the Scandinavian countries, who regularly come top or close to the top of worldwide healthcare rankings.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_with_universal_health_care