Although everyone on the planet is now an expert on epidemiology and vaccinology (or so it would seem), it is important to recognize that there is another whole world out there and to highlight this, I’ll feature some articles from a completely different area. Although drug discovery in other fields won’t get you on the News at Ten or a seat in the Royal Box at Wimbledon, they may have an enormous effect on people’s lives and on public health. That’s not to diminish the efforts and amazing development of vaccines, perhaps it is more that I wish people would realise what a massive effect drug discovery has had on them, although perhaps without the media furore. So, in this editorial (although I know I am probably preaching to the converted) I’m making available 3 articles pointing out some recent developments in and directions of cardiovascular drug discovery.
The first article, “Current and future approaches to nonclinical cardiovascular safety assessment” basically does what it says on the tin. The authors: Teresa A. Collins, Michael G. Rolf and Amy Pointon of AstraZeneca explains their goal of being able accurately to predict cardiovascular outcomes of drugs using nonclinical cardiovascular safety data. In short, they point out how the development of newer modalities requires bespoke cardiovascular safety assessment and that disease models can offer assessment of patient-relevant therapeutic indices.
Following on from this is the article by Johnny Moretto, Marc Pudlo and Céline Demougeot of PEPITE EA4267, FHU INCREASE, Université de Bourgogne Franche-Comté, F-25030 Besançon, France, entitled: “Human-based evidence for the therapeutic potential of arginase inhibitors in cardiovascular diseases” the authors indicate that arginase overactivation is seen in endothelial disfunction and subsequent cardiovascular pathology and the review assesses the relevance of novel arginase inhibitors to treat these diseases using human data and clinical studies.
To round off this offering is the article: “Cardiovascular diseases: a therapeutic perspective around the clock” by Ana Cláudia Soares and Diogo A. Fonseca of the Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Coimbra, Portugal. The authors discuss how cardiovascular disease therapy still faces major challenges, which derive essentially from high interpatient variability, new therapeutic strategies, such as chronotherapy, represent new approaches that could improve patient care.
Steve Carney was born in Liverpool, England and studied Biochemistry at Liverpool University, obtaining a BSc.(Hons) and then read for a PhD on the Biochemistry and Pathology of Connective Tissue Diseases in Manchester University, in the Departments of Medical Biochemistry and Histopathology. On completion of his PhD he moved to the Kennedy Institute of Rheumatology, London, where he worked with Professor Helen Muir FRS and Professor Tim Hardingham, on the biochemistry of experimental Osteoarthritis. He joined Eli Lilly and Co. and held a number of positions in Biology R&D, initially in the Connective Tissue Department, but latterly in the Neuroscience Department. He left Lilly to take up his present position as Managing Editor, Drug Discovery Today, at Elsevier. Currently, he also holds an honorary lectureship in Drug Discovery at the University of Surrey, UK. He has authored over 50 articles in peer-reviewed journals, written several book chapters and has held a number of patents.