Alzheimer's disease ranks among the most pressing medical needs facing the world. Because of the millions of aging baby boomers, the Alzheimer's Association anticipates the disease's frequency to soar from 5.8 million patients in the U.S. in 2019 to nearly 14 million by 2050. Deaths due to Alzheimer's disease jumped 145% between 2000 and 2017 making the disease the sixth leading cause of death.
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Hoping to capitalize on that ever-expanding market, Cortexyme (NASDAQ: CRTX) set out to develop new drugs attacking the disease at its root cause. The currently available treatments only address symptoms of the disease.