Can Clioquinol Stop Alzheimer's?

A buzz is starting to move around the Internet about Clioquinol. The drug Clioquinol (klye oh KWIN all) has been available for 80 years. Currently, Clioquinol topical cream is prescribed as an antifungal and antibacterial medication. Clioquinol topical prevents fungus from growing on your skin. Clioquinol has also been used in the past to treat diarrhea and other gastrointestinal disorders. The drug was taken off the market in several countries in the 1960's when 10,000 Japanese suffered from an epidemic of subacute myelo-optic neuropathy (SMON).

A poorly written press release out of Canada's McGill University starts with this paragraph:

Recent animal studies have shown that clioquinol – an 80-year old drug once used to treat diarrhea and other gastrointestinal disorders – can reverse the progression of Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and Huntington’s diseases. Scientists, however, had a variety of theories to attempt to explain how a single compound could have such similar effects on three unrelated neurodegenerative disorders.

There is no explanation of the above and there are no further mentions of Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and Huntington’s diseases in the release.

The advance online edition of the study was published in Oct. 2008 in the Journal of Biological Chemistry.

I cannot find anything of any real substance about this on the internet. I should mention that you can obtain Clioquinol from a chemical wholesaler.

It does sound interesting, so I'll continue to search for additional information.

Old gastrointestinal drug slows aging, McGill researchers say

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