WASHINGTON: A new kind of drug to fight Alzheimer’s has shown promise when given to people in the early stages of the disease, drug-maker Eli Lilly said Wednesday.
Known as solanezumab, the drug is a monoclonal antibody that helps the brain clear amyloid-beta before it clumps together to form plaques that are implicated in Alzheimer’s, which affects 44 million people living with dementia worldwide, and has no effective treatment.
In 2012, solanezumab was shown to be no better than a sugar pill in clinical trials.
An editorial in the New England Journal of Medicine in 2014 said that as many as one quarter of patients studied in the early trials may have had dementia but not Alzheimer’s, and that scientific trials should continue in people with confirmed Alzheimer’s.
This time, researchers reported on randomized, double blind trials involving 1,322 people with mild Alzheimer’s disease.
Some were given the drug right away, others after a period of two years. Both doctors and patients were unaware of whether they were using a sugar pill or the actual drug.
When researchers compared the cognitive function of the two groups two years into the study, the difference was “statistically significant,” Eli Lilly said in a statement.
The study is published in the journal Alzheimer’s and Dementia: Translational Research and Clinical Interventions, and was discussed at the Alzheimer’s Association Annual Conference in the US capital.
Promise seen for drug in patients with early Alzheimer’s
Promise seen for drug in patients with early Alzheimer’s
Danish general says there are no Chinese or Russian ships near Greenland
- “There are Chinese and Russian vessels in the Arctic Ocean, but not near Greenland,” Major General Soren Andersen said
- He had extended an invitation for the US to join exercises planned on the island this year
NUUK: The head of Denmark’s military Joint Arctic Command said on Friday that there were no Chinese or Russian ships observed near Greenland, despite repeated claims by US President Donald Trump to the contrary.
Trump says Greenland is vital to US security and has not ruled out the use of force to take it. European nations this week sent small numbers of military personnel to the island at Denmark’s request.
“We don’t see any Russian or Chinese vessels around Greenland... there are Chinese and Russian vessels in the Arctic Ocean, but not near Greenland,” Major General Soren Andersen told Reuters.
Speaking on board a Danish warship in Nuuk, Greenland’s capital, Andersen said that he had extended an invitation for the United States to join exercises planned on the island this year.
“We had a meeting today with a lot of NATO partners including the US and invited them to participate in this exercise,” said Andersen. When asked if the Americans will join, the general replied “I don’t know that yet.”
Denmark’s Joint Arctic Command enforces sovereignty and conducts surveillance, fisheries inspection and search-and-rescue across Greenland and the Faroe Islands, drawing on patrol vessels, aircraft, helicopters and satellite-based monitoring.
Headquartered in Nuuk, it also fields Greenland’s Sirius dog-sled patrol for long-range land operations and maintains about 150 staff across command, logistics and fixed Arctic stations.
Responding to Trump’s criticism that Denmark does too little to defend Greenland, Copenhagen last year announced a 42 billion Danish crowns ($6.54 billion) Arctic defense package.
