Promising Alzheimer’s drug delays disease onset.
OAN’s Noah Herring
2:43 PM – Tuesday, July 18, 2023
A groundbreaking study has revealed that Lilly Biotechnology Center’s Alzheimer’s drug has shown remarkable results in slowing the progression of the disease. The drug, called Donanemab, demonstrated a significant slowdown of 22% to 35% compared to a placebo study.
The study, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, measured the effectiveness of Donanemab by assessing daily activities such as driving, managing finances, and engaging in conversations about current events. The results clearly indicate that the experimental drug outperformed the placebo group.
Lilly has already submitted an application for FDA approval earlier this year and is optimistic about receiving the drug’s approval by the end of the year.
It’s important to note that Donanemab is specifically designed to slow the progression of Alzheimer’s in its early stages and may not be effective for advanced cases of the disease.
“Finally there’s some hope, right, that we can talk about,” Lilly’s Dr. John Sims told reporters on Monday at the Alzheimer’s conference.
“We don’t cure the disease,” he said. “Diabetes doesn’t have a cure either — it doesn’t mean you can’t have very meaningful treatments for patients.”
The Eli Lilly drug targets and clears beta-amyloid, sticky proteins that form brain-clogging plaques. However, it’s important to be aware of the potential side effects of the drug, which include brain swelling or bleeding. In fact, three deaths were reported during the Lilly study, with around a quarter of the Donanemab subjects experiencing brain swelling and around 20% experiencing micro-bleeding.
Some scientists have raised concerns about the drug’s efficacy and the selection of patients who should try it.
“The modest benefits would likely not be questioned by patients, clinicians or payers if amyloid antibodies were low risk, inexpensive and simple to administer. However, they are none of these,” Dr. Eric Widera of the University of California, San Francisco, wrote in a JAMA editorial accompanying Lilly’s new data.
While the latest research shows progress in the fight against Alzheimer’s, there is still a need for more impactful and safer treatments, according to Dr. Gil D. Rabinovici and Dr. Renaud La Joie of the University of California, San Francisco.
In a related development, the FDA recently approved Leqembi, an Alzheimer’s remedy developed by Eisai and Biogen. However, similar to Donanemab, the drug comes with a warning about potential side effects of brain swelling and bleeding.
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