The next time someone tells you that artificial intelligence, or any other new technology, is going to cure every disease, point them to the effort to fight heart attacks and strokes, which together are the largest killer in the developed world.
Because again and again, pharmaceutical researchers have learned the same hard lesson: technologies that were supposed to speed new medicines to patients have fallen short. Two studies presented Saturday at the annual meeting of the American Heart Association are a perfect example. A new understanding of genetics was supposed to increase the odds of success – and did anything but.
One study showed that a Novartis drug, pelacarsen, had no effect on the rate of heart attacks and strokes despite lowering a substance in the blood called lp(a), which genetics said should reduce cardiovascular risk. Another large study, from Novo Nordisk, of an anti-inflammatory targeting a protein called IL-6 also showed no benefit.
