Doctors and scientists want drug regulators and research funding agencies to consider medicines that delay ageing-related disease as legitimate drugs. Such treatments have a physiological basis, researchers say, and could extend a person's healthy years by slowing down the processes that underlie common diseases of ageing — making them worthy of government approval. On 24 June, researchers will meet with regulators from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to make the case for a clinical trial designed to show the validity of the approach.
Current treatments for diseases related to ageing "just exchange one disease for another", says physician Nir Barzilai of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York. That is because people treated for one age-related disease often go on to die from another relatively soon thereafter. "What we want to show is that if we delay ageing, that's the best way to delay disease."
takyon: The "pill" in question is the drug metformin, currently used to treat type 2 diabetes under the brand name Glucophage. People with type 2 diabetes will not be enrolled in the anti-aging trial.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Friday June 19 2015, @02:20AM
http://www.drugs.com/price-guide/metformin [drugs.com]
http://www.goodrx.com/metformin [goodrx.com]
http://health.costhelper.com/diabetes-medication.html [costhelper.com]
or $0.50
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by frojack on Friday June 19 2015, @02:48AM
But, its still not clear to my semi-functioning brain if we are talking about a placebo on not.
Because if it didn't have to have any actual ingredients we sohould be able to get the price down to 5 cents.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Friday June 19 2015, @03:00AM
Check the Wikipedia article in the summary if you want to know more about metformin.
The proponents mentioned in the Nature article are also interested in having the FDA acknowledge a broad category of "anti-aging" drugs as a valuable and achievable goal. See also this comment [soylentnews.org].
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(Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 19 2015, @06:29AM
Meh, the FDA... They got gutted by underfunded mission creep years ago:
http://www.fda.gov/ohrms/dockets/AC/07/briefing/2007-4329b_02_01_FDA%20Report%20on%20Science%20and%20Technology.pdf [fda.gov]