2025 May be the Year

By Dale Bredesen, M.D., Chief Science Officer for Apollo Health

A 48-year-old woman began to complain of depression, memory loss, and problems analyzing information. These problems increased markedly after a hysterectomy, yet she was not given any bio-identical hormone replacement. She saw a neurologist, who told her it was just anxiety. She continued to progress, without a diagnosis or treatment (except an antidepressant, which did not help), until finally, at 57, nine years after her initial complaints, she was sent to the Mayo Clinic, where a diagnosis of advanced Alzheimer’s disease was made.

I have heard stories like this far too often, and they sadden me beyond what I can express. So many people dying needlessly, despite published effective treatment, successful clinical trials, and even documentation of sustained improvement for over a decade (Sustained Cognitive Improvement in Alzheimer’s Disease Patients Following a Precision Medicine Protocol: Case Series ). As we have observed repeatedly, the earlier you treat, the easier it is to achieve marked improvement. If only this unfortunate woman had come for optimal treatment at 48, or 49, or 50, or 51 — were several years of progressive symptoms not enough to move some practitioners to read the published data?

Standard of care medicine and public health must change their antiquated ways — will 2025 be the year that this begins in earnest? A recent survey by the Commonwealth Fund (U.S. Health Care from a Global Perspective, 2022: Accelerating Spending, Worsening Outcomes) found that the US spends the most on healthcare of any country in the world, and yet, compared to other countries like Australia, the UK, Switzerland, France, Germany, and Japan, it has the poorest health. During my career, I have watched as Medicine has transitioned from a profession to a business to a scam.

Desperation with this morbid system recently led to the murder of the CEO of a predatory healthcare company, a company that used AI to deny as many claims as possible. Patient need was nothing, company profits everything. Now it has been proposed that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. serve as the Secretary of Health and Human Services, and Dr. Mehmet Oz lead Medicare Services. Understandably, there have been both critics and supporters of these nominations, but no matter which side you are on, it is clear that the status quo in American healthcare is disastrous, especially when it comes to chronic conditions such as metabolic syndrome, chronic renal failure, and inflammatory bowel disease.

It is my fervent hope that 2025 will be the year that we begin to see a paradigm shift that addresses the dire need to modernize health and healthcare in the US. I hope that we shall begin to move toward a less barbaric system, in which food is healthier, pharmaceuticals are more affordable, and patient outcomes are prioritized over corporate incomes. I hope that our current clinical trial will help to prove what we have been documenting for over a decade now: that cognitive decline can be reversed successfully in most people, especially if you begin treatment in the early stages. I hope we shall see the first steps taken toward reducing the global burden of dementia, and ultimately toward reducing other neurodegenerative conditions, as well. That is a lot to hope for, I know, but 2025 just may be the year …