Latin America Spearheads a Global Effort to Find an Effective Alzheimer’s Drug

A cluster of families in Colombia who carry a rare genetic mutation that causes the disease have become a focus of the search for a treatment

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When Alejandra was a 16-year-old teenager back in 2007, she had the aspirations of any girl her age. She attended an escuela secundaria in Medellín, one of Colombia's largest cities. Schoolwork was interspersed with as many hours as she could squeeze in hanging out with friends at favorite haunts throughout the city.

Then her mother, Yolanda, started to lose her memory. The quiet but conscientious woman would say hello to a visitor and, moments later, would repeat the same greeting again—then again. By her mid-40s, Yolanda had developed early-onset Alzheimer's disease. For Alejandra, it meant that her adolescence had come to an end. Like it or not, she had to take on the chief responsibility of full-time care for her increasingly helpless mother.

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