Gold-diggers

Open the Door to Curing Alzheimer's
Why This Research Must Become an Urgent Priority

By Robert Essner
Tuesday, June 27, 2006; A21

America is getting serious about preparing for the possibility of an outbreak of avian flu. Would that it could muster the same sense of urgency for a disease that is already here and is certain to become epidemic. The disease is Alzheimer's. It will claim one in 10 baby boomers, create a personal and fiscal nightmare for their families, and drain -- if not bankrupt -- state and federal health-care budgets. Medicare now pays one-third of all its health-care funds for some 4.5 million Alzheimer's patients. Are we ready for three times that number?

Alzheimer's doesn't have to be an inevitable part of aging. It is a disease for which research can find a cure, or at least a more effective treatment. In that way, it could be like HIV-AIDS -- a disease that, for most sufferers, went from a lethal diagnosis to a treatable chronic condition within six years of its discovery. One breakthrough AIDS drug rapidly led to another, because we mobilized pandemic-strength muscle against it. In addition, the Food and Drug Administration created review and approval processes that helped new therapies for AIDS reach people who needed them years ahead of what would have otherwise been possible.

The FDA now needs to give the same priority status to drugs for Alzheimer's as it has for AIDS and cancer treatments. And, the federal government needs to designate Alzheimer's as a No. 1 research priority.

If we don't do these things, the projections are staggering. Within the next five years, nearly a half-million new Alzheimer's cases will be diagnosed annually, as 78 million baby boomers reach age 65. Given those numbers, most of us will either become an Alzheimer's patient, care for one in our home or know a patient in our extended family. By robbing victims of memory, Alzheimer's strips away individuality, dignity and independence.

Alzheimer's is expensive. It requires $19,000 a year in out-of-pocket costs for each caregiver family. Last year Medicare spent $91 billion for Alzheimer's. That figure will nearly double in just four years -- and keep soaring as 14 million cases are diagnosed in boomers' lifetimes.

Within the pharmaceutical industry, there are 28 Alzheimer's compounds in development. But progress on all fronts is unconscionably slow considering the looming shadow of this epidemic. And, given the complexity of the disease, no single research organization has the resources to research all its facets as quickly as we must.

I have a little difficulty listening to Big Pharma scream about insufficient resources being put into research. If they cut into their obscene profits, there is a lot more that they could be doing.