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A new document provides compelling evidence that the herpes virus responsible for cold sores can also be linked to Alzheimer's disease. The results show that antiviral drugs significantly reduce the risk of senile dementia in patients with serious herpes infections.
The journal, published in the journal Frontiers in Neuring Science, opens the seductive perspective of a simple and effective preventive treatment for one of the most debilitating and costly neurological disorders of humanity.
Herpes viruses are notoriously persistent. They stay alive in our neurons and immune cells, and reactivate and re-emerge in characteristic vesicles when we are weakened by stress or disease. Most people are infected with herpes simplex virus 1 (HSV1) by the time they reach advanced age.
"HSV1 may account for 50% or more of Alzheimer's disease cases," says Professor Ruth Itzhaki, an expert in the field of Alzheimer's disease, who has been studying for more than 25 years at the University of Manchester in England a potential link.
Itzhaki has already shown that cold sores, caused by HSV1, occur more frequently in APOE-ε4 carriers, a variant of the gene that increases the risk of Alzheimer's disease.
"Our theory is that, in APOE-ε4 carriers, reactivation is more common or more damaging in brain cells infected with HSV1, resulting in the accumulation of damage that leads to the development of the Alzheimer's disease. "
Taiwan is one of the few countries in the world to collect the demographic data needed to test the theory of HSV1-Alzheimer's. 99.9% of the population is included in a national health insurance research database, which is extensively exploited for information on infections and microbial diseases.
In 2017-2018, three studies were published describing Taiwanese data on the development of senile dementia – the main cause of which is Alzheimer's disease – and on the treatment of patients with obvious signs of infection by HSV or varicella-zoster virus (VZV, chickenpox virus).
"The most striking findings include evidence that the risk of senile dementia is much greater in people with HSV, and that herpesviral antiviral therapy dramatically decreases the number of subjects who are severely affected by HSV1 and who develop eventually a dementia. "
Previous discoveries of Itzhaki's research provide a mechanistic link that corroborates these epidemiological discoveries. His research team discovered that HSV1 causes protein deposits that are characteristic of Alzheimer's disease, including "plaques" between neurons and "entanglements" within them.
"Viral DNA is very specifically found in plaques of post-mortem brain tissue in people with Alzheimer's disease. The major plaque and entanglement proteins also accumulate in HSV1-infected cell cultures – and antiviral drugs can prevent this, "says Itzhaki.
"It should be noted that the results of these Taiwanese studies only apply to serious HSV1 (or VZV) infections, which are rare," says Itzhaki. "Ideally, we would study rates of dementia in people who have contracted mild HSV1 infection, including cold sores (cold sores) or mild genital herpes, but they are far less likely to Be documented. "
Although further research is needed to confirm and define a causal link between HSV1 infection and Alzheimer's disease, Itzhaki is excited about the prospects for treatment.
"As more than 150 publications strongly support the role of HSV1 in Alzheimer's disease, these findings from Taiwan greatly justify the use of safe, well-tolerated, herpesvirus antivirals to treat Alzheimer's disease. "
Source: Borders
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