Lorena Arancibia Cárcamo

DEMENTIA is the leading cause of death in England. Women are twice as likely to contract Alzheimer’s than men. It costs the economy £35billion a year, two thirds of which is paid for by carers and families.

Yet research has been historically “chronically underfunded” by the government.

Lorena Arancibia Cárcamo, co-leader of The Francis Crick Institute’s Cellular Phase of Alzheimer’s Disease Lab, told the New Journal why this complicated and misunderstood disease has missed out on proper funding.

Dr Arancibia said: “With cancer, there has been a lot of funding over the last few decades. Alzheimer’s was identified over 100 years ago. For every dementia researcher there’s four cancer researchers, and we’ve made massive pro­gress in cancer so we know that if you have more people researching the disease. We can make huge strides in tackling it. So that’s what we would like to see.

“There’s been this misconception that it’s just a natural part of aging and it really is not. Alzheimer’s disease is a disease and therefore in principle it can be treated.

“The government has realised that there’s a problem and so it has committed to doubling dementia research funding, so that’s going to increase the pledges to £160million a year by next year.”

But this sum is overshadowed by the huge cost Alzheimer’s has on the economy.

Dr Arancibia said Alzheimer’s, which is the disease that originates from a build-up of protein in the brain that causes dementia – the symptom, has been the leading cause of death in England since 2011.

In itself, Alzheimer’s is not fatal, but dementia has devastating effects, which makes patients “very frail” causing them to be susceptible to infections, heart failure or pneumonia.

“The most commonly known effect of Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias is memory loss. But it also has devastating effects on higher brain function that people take for granted. You lose things like your balance, your coordination, and then other autonomic functions like your heart rate, your breathing, digestion and your sleep cycle is severely affected,” Dr Arancibia said.

At Arancibia’s lab at the Crick in Somers Town – part of the Knowledge Quarter – they are investigating immune cells in the brain to understand how they react with the protein Amyloid beta.

Alzheimer’s is thought to develop through a com­bination of many different genes and environmental factors like smoking, drinking and sleep.

But Dr Arancibia said there’s a lot we still don’t know. Over the last few years two new drugs have been developed to tackle the protein.

She added: “There’s currently no cure, but the development of therapies in the last couple of years has given people hope. It’s such a complicated disease that I don’t believe there will ever be one single cure. However, by investing more into research and diagnostics, we’ll be able to find the right treatment for the right patient at the right time.”