Alzheimer’s Disease; Advocates Hail Breakthrough

Successful early overseas trials of skin patches that can stave off Alzheimer’s disease are another step to finding the source of the dementia and a potential cure, New Zealand patient advocates say.

University of South Florida scientists say successful trials with a skin patch vaccine on mice stimulated their immune systems to attack clumps of proteins in the brain that lead to Alzheimer’s.

Dementia, mainly caused by Alzheimer’s, affects between 30,000 and 38,000 people in New Zealand. Alzheimer’s causes progressive mental debilitation, affecting memory, understanding and ability to reason.

The Florida researchers say the skin patch vaccine dramatically slowed the build-up of toxic proteins in mouse brains for four months at a time.

They hope it will be available to high-risk human patients within six to 10 years.

Alzheimer’s New Zealand spokeswoman Florence Leota said yesterday that there had been research breakthroughs in recent years, offering hope.

“It feels like we are getting closer,” she said.

Leota said the disease was random and progressive, and while it was more severe in older age groups there was anecdotal evidence it was affecting more people in their 40s.

In New Zealand, without a cure, it would become a large problem in the next 10 years as the population got older.

There were estimates that the numbers of New Zealanders with dementia would double to 76,000 by 2015-20.

“In New Zealand we are sitting on the edge, saying `Yeah we know it’s going to hit us’ — like a sort of dementia tsunami — and we are struggling to see if we can get a lifeboat out,” Leota said.

She said the group was lobbying drug agency Pharmac for subsidies for the acetyl- cholinesterase inhibitors which are the only medication that can slow the progression of the disease. There were no subsidies at present.

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