Analysis: We can stop multiple sclerosis, and this is how

Professor Alan Thompson, Dean of the UCL Faculty of Brain Sciences, writes about progress made in finding treatments for multiple sclerosis. Twenty-five years ago there were no treatments for multiple sclerosis (MS) - a neurological condition that affects more than 100,000 people living in the UK. Today the picture is very different. There have been major advances in treatment and, following a series of more recent discoveries, we believe we can stop MS. We've reached a point where we know what's causing the disease to progress. In people with MS, a protective substance that surrounds your nerves - called myelin - becomes damaged, which makes it harder for messages to get received, causing problems with how a person walks, moves, eats and thinks. Without this protective coating nerve cells become vulnerable, and once a nerve cell is lost, this causes disability.