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AstraZeneca tests a candidate treatment for Alzheimer's disease

Delaware Public Media

  Delaware-based pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca is currently testing a drug that has potential to treat Alzheimer’s disease. Many potential Alzheimer’s treatments right now are targeting the abnormal growth of two types of proteins in the brains affected by the disease. These are beta-amyloids and tau proteins, which are also known as “plaques” and “tangles,” respectively.

The drug, called AZD3293, was produced by AstraZeneca’s Neuroscience iMed group in partnership with Eli Lilly. AZD3293 works by blocking the beta-secretase or BACE enzyme, that produces these plaques. AstraZeneca began developing the drug in 1999, shortly after the discovery of the BACE enzyme.

Tina Olsson, a product director at Neuroscience iMed, says that the drug had some promising results in the phase one clinical trials.

 

"We saw that the drug had very strong target engagement. Basically, we saw that the drug does exactly what it is designed to do," said Olsson.

By that, she means the drug demonstrated decreases in beta-amyloid placques in the cerebro-spinal fluid of both their diseased and healthy subjects.

The drug is currently in phase two and three clinical trials, meaning that they have tested the drug for side-effects and including more human subjects in trials. The trials include 2,200 subjects. The first patient was enrolled in this phase last December and they expect to complete the study by 2019.

There is no cure for Alzheimer’s to date. A study last year from Cleveland Clinic showed that over 99 percent of Alzheimer’s treatments failed to reach the market between 2002 and 2012. If AZD3293 is approved, AstraZeneca estimates the drug could drum up sales up to $5 billion dollars.

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