The Next Alzheimer’s Breakthrough Will Take More Than Just Science

Alzheimer’s research is entering a new phase, as treatments that have taken decades to develop begin to reach patients. But getting those advances to people will depend on more than scientific progress alone, according to pioneering Alzheimer’s researcher John Hardy.Speaking at WIRED Health in April, Hardy, chair of the Molecular Biology of Neurological Disease at University College London, said that alongside more effective drugs, better diagnosis and political will were still needed to improve treatment of Alzheimer’s disease. “We’ve got to get better,” he said.Hardy was instrumental in identifying the central role of amyloid, a form of protein found in the brain and body, in Alzheimer’s disease in the 1990s. He and his colleagues helped establish the idea that deposits of amyloid form plaques around brain cells. These plaques are thought to disrupt normal brain function, increasing activity and triggering inflammatory responses.At the time, he said he was “naively optimistic” about how quickly this discovery would lead to effective treatment. “But now, finally, we've got somewhere,” he said.His findings led to the development of antibodies designed to prevent amyloid deposits forming. But these early approaches did not “suck amyloid out of the brain of those people who already had the