May 18, 2016

Today's Top Alzheimer's News

MUST READS

A May 18, 2016 The Hill opinion piece by Barbra Streisand and Ronald O. Perelman urged Congress to “go the final mile on equitable representation in medical research.” According to the authors, “Our nation can’t afford not to make this a priority. The value proposition is clear. The personal toll of diseases like Alzheimer’s, cancer and cardiovascular disease is incalculable, but the economic cost of missed research opportunities is apparent every day…Last month, the U.S. Senate HELP Committee passed a series of biomedical innovation bills, which can be bundled into a companion to the House-passed 21st Century Cures Act. We applaud this bipartisan commitment to fighting disease and saving lives. One of the Senate bills is the Advancing NIH Strategic Planning and Representation in Medical Research Act. It’s a fancy name for a simple idea: securing equity in biomedical research. Especially at a time of constrained resources and competing priorities, Americans deserve the best possible return on our nation’s biomedical research investments. We urge the Congress to pass this legislation, for our health and for our future.”

A May 17, 2016 FierceBiotech article reported that “a pair of investigators at Harvard Med and Boston University are bootstrapping a small biotech upstart with an eye to pursuing candidate selection in animal studies for a new approach to treating Alzheimer’s disease.” According to the article, “The company, Klogene, is concentrating on Klotho, a protein that has been run through a variety of preclinical programs, demonstrating potential for a range of neurodegenerative diseases, including Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, and ALS as well as multiple sclerosis. The growing anti-aging research community has also been enthralled by early signs that increased levels of Klotho make mouse models smarter--the kind of overall cognitive enhancer that may just help increase a healthy life span for the masses.”

A May 17, 2016 UPI.com article reported that “Making meals more enjoyable for people with dementia might reduce their risk of malnutrition and dehydration, researchers report.”

A May 17, 2016 San Francisco Business Times article profiled the Dolby family’s efforts to tackle Alzheimer’s. According to the article, “But in trying to find new routes to treatments and diagnostics for the memory-robbing disease, Dolby Family Ventures is seeking better connections, inside and outside the brain. The San Francisco family foundation is putting its money behind finding a treatment, cure or test for the disease that in September 2013 overtook patriarch Ray Dolby, the founder of legendary sound technology company Dolby Laboratories Inc. (NYSE: DLB). But it also is creating networks within its portfolio of young companies and established researchers to quickly move potential Alzheimer’s drugs from lab bench to patients’ bedsides.”

A May 17, 2016 NPR.org article highlighted the issues important to older voters. According to the article, “In a conference call with reporters, Dychtwald lists a host of issues that the candidates should be forced to address, including the retraining of older workers, finding a cure for Alzheimer's disease and combating ageism.”