INTERVIEW – For the first time in twenty years, a drug, lecanemab, has shown benefit for patients. The explanations and the perspective of Pr Frédéric Blanc, neurologist at the Memory Center of the University Hospitals of Strasbourg.
THE FIGARO. – What is this new drug against Alzheimer’s that arouses hope?
Prof. Frédéric BLANC. – This is a molecule called lecanemab. It is a monoclonal antibody, that is to say a drug that stimulates the patient’s immune system to destroy certain biological markers of the disease: in particular amyloid plaques, these protein aggregates found in the brains of Alzheimer’s patients. After a clinical trial that lasted eighteen months and the results of which were unveiled at a congress in December 2022, several positive results were noted.
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First, the reduction of these amyloid plaques but also of another protein, phospho-tau, which is the marker of a common disorder in patients, neurofibrillary degeneration. Second, lecanemab produced a small, but very real, positive effect on cognition in patients measured on clinical scales. And above all, the patients worked…
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