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Ben McKeen wrote:

> the headline "NEW MIRACLE DRUG COULD SAVE MICHAEL J.FOX"....
> Rilutek ... FDA approved for ALS or Lou Gehrigs Disease ...
> shows great promise in treating PD by stopping the progress of the
> disease.... NPF is recruiting PWP volunteers for
> testing.

Hello,

Oy, the heady hype of headlines!  Book titles, too.  I was in a
bookstore the other day, and half the books in the health section
contain the word "miracle" in their titles (well, maybe not half!)
I bought a copy of "The Antioxidant Miracle", not because of the
title, but rather the author, Dr. Lester Packer, who has been the
leading researcher of antioxidants for the past four decades.

Anyway -- the drug is a glutamate antagonist, quite a new approach
to treating PD (hence "new miracle"), and it's in Phase III clinical
trials, meaning the last stage of testing. See NPF web page
http://parkinson.org/pIII.htm.  The call for volunteer subjects is
for PWPs who are still untreated and in the earliest stages of PD.
So I wonder what will be the utility of the drug for people who have
had PD for a while, and what miracle it will take to "save" those of
us who are in that situation.

Phil Tompkins
Hoboken NJ
age 61/dx 1990