UK pharmaceutical industry voices hope for Alzheimer's treatment
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Posted on Apr 02, 2008, 8 p.m.
By Jeanelle Topping
The research and development of Alzheimer's treatments has earned the renewed focus of Britain's pharmaceutical industry to find new ways of treating and possibly reversing the disease.
The research and development of Alzheimer's treatments has earned the renewed focus of Britain's pharmaceutical industry to find new ways of treating and possibly reversing the disease.
Richard Barker, director general of the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry (ABPI), said: "Alzheimer's has become much more prominent in people's minds.
"Since we're surviving other diseases, we're getting older and more of us will fall prey to Alzheimer's, so we're very focused on trying to get cures for this devastating disease in particular."
According to the ABPI, there are around 40 new medications in the pipeline, which have been developed to tackle the disease in different ways.
Mr Barker added: "There's a lot of hope that these new ways of doing it will make a real difference, even if they can't reverse the disease – and some of them might – to at least slow the whole process down and therefore give people longer, more useful, more satisfying lives."
Latest figures from the Alzheimer's society show that there are currently 700,000 people with dementia in the UK and it is estimated that there will be over a million people with dementia by 2025.
