New $30M venture philanthropy fund aims at revolutionizing the diagnosis of Alzheimer’s Disease

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Why diag­nos­ing Alzheimer’s today is so difficult—and how we can do bet­ter (Bill Gates):

“Alzheimer’s research is a fron­tier where we can dra­mat­i­cal­ly improve human life—both the lives of peo­ple who have the dis­ease and their loved ones. I’m opti­mistic that we can sub­stan­tial­ly alter the course of Alzheimer’s if we make progress in sev­er­al key areas. One of the biggest things we could do right now is devel­op a reli­able, afford­able, and acces­si­ble diagnostic.

The process of get­ting diag­nosed with Alzheimer’s today is less than ideal…First, it can be expen­sive and invasive…Second, patients aren’t being test­ed for the dis­ease until they start show­ing cog­ni­tive decline. The more we under­stand about Alzheimer’s, the clear­er it becomes that the dis­ease begins much ear­li­er than we pre­vi­ous­ly thought…

That’s why my next invest­ment in Alzheimer’s research is in a new fund called Diag­nos­tics Accel­er­a­tor. This project of the Alzheimer’s Drug Dis­cov­ery Foun­da­tion (ADDF) aims to accel­er­ate bold new ideas for ear­li­er and bet­ter diag­no­sis of the dis­ease. Today I’m join­ing Leonard Laud­er, ADDF, the Dol­by fam­i­ly, the Charles and Helen Schwab Foun­da­tion, and oth­er donors in com­mit­ting more than $30 mil­lion to help launch Diag­nos­tics Accel­er­a­tor…

My hope is that this invest­ment builds a bridge from aca­d­e­m­ic research to a reli­able, afford­able, and acces­si­ble diag­nos­tic. I expect to see lots of new play­ers come to the table, who have inno­v­a­tive new ideas but might not have pre­vi­ous­ly had the resources to explore them. If you think you’re one of these bold thinkers, we want to hear your great ideas. I encour­age you to apply for fund­ing on the new Diag­nos­tics Accel­er­a­tor web­site here.”

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