Medicare recently announced that it will broadly cover Leqembi, a breakthrough treatment that slows memory loss for people with early-stage Alzheimer's.
The announcement puts the medicine within reach for roughly 1.5 million Medicare beneficiaries in the early stages of that fatal dementia. Previously, the drug was functionally off-limits -- even though the FDA approved it back in January -- due to barriers imposed by Medicare officials.
Unfortunately, those barriers remain in place for future Alzheimer's treatments that hit the market in the months and years to come. Unless Medicare officials remove those barriers, beneficiaries will needlessly struggle to obtain lifesaving medicines. And time is of the essence, since at least one other promising Alzheimer's treatment is expected to win FDA approval soon.
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