An Alzheimer’s disease drug could protect against the deadly effects of two nerve agents, researchers report.
Exposure to organophosphorus compounds, including the nerve agents sarin and soman, can cause seizures, breathing difficulty, and death. Edson X. Albuquerque of the University of Maryland School of Medicine in Baltimore and his colleagues used guinea pigs to test the drug galantamine—approved for patients with mild-to-moderate Alzheimer’s disease—as an antidote to organophosphorus exposure. The drug and the two nerve agents affect the same enzyme.