I’d be careful to say they’ll replace Biden. They will adjust the public representation strategy. And then they will wait and see. If he stops ‘dozing off’ in public and starts being a nuisance is one thing, if not – then it is different.
The debate everyone is discussing with so much gusto is not about politics at all. It is about medicine.
Just for reference and better understanding.
Alzheimer’s, which Biden is manifesting in his transition from its early to moderate stage, is a lengthy disease. He steadily developed ‘pre-dementia’ already during the election campaign in 2020. And almost everyone in his team, family, political party and US leadership knew about it or it was largely known everywhere where it might be interesting.
Obviously, all possible actual and projected resources were spent for Biden’s treatment. If there is something in the new method, they surely used it. (At the same time, Joe Biden just has to be socially active addressing tasks beyond the degrading cognitive capabilities, which has traditionally been considered an efficient way to slow down the disease progress).
Yet, nothing helped: neither traditional means (broad communication, cognitive trainings, diet), or registered drugs and innovative candidate schemes. Biden is surely, irreversibly and at quite a good pace going downstairs. Light lapses alternate with dark moments, with ‘darkness’ getting thicker and light moments rarer.
The strategy of those in his entourage is clear:
– to create maximum communication comfort for the patient himself (repeating his own, even absurd, actions like this was at Omaha Beach, maximum slowing of movements at meetings and events with him – all those involved in public meetings with Biden use group movements like at an aquatic training session in an elderly nursing facility);
– drug-induced preparation to bring him to top shape before major events. They managed to do it in March during his address in Congress, but they have failed now. Understanding the importance of the occasion, it’s a good reason to confirm the overall poor performance of the therapy. On March 8, during his State of the Union address, he occurred to be in a decent shape due to the disease status, not thanks to the treatment. This time, they failed to bring him ‘to light’, despite the rigorous preparation.
This does not mean he cannot be elected president. Again, dementia is a lengthy disease. The question is when its progress can no longer be hidden or attributed to opponents’ malicious machinations. Biden manifested apraxia (movement disorders) long time ago and aphasia (speech problems) yesterday. Let’s add a vivid syndrome, ‘episodic memory’, or bright reminiscences (often partially or fully false) about a long-gone episode, quite insignificant and unrelated to actual communication contexts. (Like all these: ‘I’ve known Putin for 45 years’, ‘I grew up in an Italian community and went to this church’ and things like that). One can live with this set and even ‘work’ for years. Especially if those around you are loyal and trying to maintain ‘the normality illusion’. This is like it is and like it will be.
So, I’d be careful to say they are going to replace Biden. They will adjust the public representation strategy. And then they will wait and see. If he stops ‘dozing off’ in public and starts being a nuisance is one thing, if not – then it is different.
And, of course, if you do it right, it is necessary to audit all the nonsense Alzheimer’s drugs the cherished Big Pharma has invented and registered in recent years to treat the disease. (This is one of the pharma industry’s most expensive ‘megaprojects’ with a potential market capacity higher than that of Ozempic weight loss drugs).
By the way, when it comes to neurodegenerative diseases, there are more scandals and withdrawals of registration certificates and the scientific articles underpinning them than anywhere else. Drugs get more costly with an ever-lower effect.
But it’s more likely that both parties in the US will change their candidates to 40-year-old moderate adequate politicians than that the pharma leaders and the FDA will admit they were wrong and revisit or revise anything.