Pratchett writes on Alzheimer’s drug Aricept

17 August 2008 (15:02) Appearances Alzheimer's Interviews Terry Pratchett News News Archives

The full text Terry Pratchett’s article, which begins with “The NHS is seriously injured,” and was found on page six of today’s News of the World, can be found on the website today.  In it, Pratchett complains that the NHS in Britain is not doing it’s job:

A drug called Aricept can slow the progress of the disease, and the good news is it costs just £2.50 a day.

The bad news is there are 400,000 Alzheimer’s sufferers in the U.K. so Aricept has been ruled out for NHS use in the mild stages of the disease everywhere except Scotland…. I’m a millionaire so I have no trouble paying, but there are people who can’t…. I would very much like to know the basis on which these decisions are made because some of them don’t seem to make very much sense. It is interesting to note I could get Viagra for free. I’m not too certain it’s the State’s job to provide Viagra.

He also points out that the NHS is not equipped to handle the upcoming wave of aging baby boomers.
Other interesting tidbits:

My wife and PA both noticed real changes in me after two or three months on it. I used to fumble with buttons and needed help with seatbelts. Now, I get dressed normally and seatbelts slide in first time. Mentally, it’s the difference between a sunny day and an overcast day. Ye Gods, that’s worth it!

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 I can still work at home and control my environment, and my rare variant of the disease is not yet a real burden. The novels turn up as they always have — only the typing is hard. There will now be a moment when the letter A, say, vanishes. It’s as if the keyboard closes up and the letter A is not there anymore. Then I’ll blink a few times and concentrate and it comes back.

I’ve handed in my driving licence — if my brain won’t let me see that A, it might not let me see the child on the pedestrian crossing. Unlikely, at this stage, but who would risk it?

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And I can afford a voice recognition programme for the computer. There’s no way I’m going to retire, I’ll be writing until I die. It’s my passion.  I stood up and said I had Alzheimer’s. I didn’t expect all the fuss, or my mailbox to melt. Good grief, you write best sellers for 25 years in a kind of welcome obscurity, then you catch one lousy disease and every chat show wants to talk to you.

Also, catch Pratchett tomorrow on a special Panorama program called The NHS Postcode: It Could Be You Monday at 8:30 p.m.