Each year, over 5,600 people are newly diagnosed with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS), which gradually deteriorates motor neurons in the brain and usually causes death within three to five years. As their muscles atrophy, ALS sufferers slowly lose the ability to move, eat, speak and – eventually – breathe. Medical professionals are as helpless to stop the disease as those afflicted by it. ALS is incurable.
The ALS Therapy Development Institute wants to change that. A grant from the Baldwin Donor-Advised Fund at Innovia Foundation will aid the Institute in its mission of finding a viable treatment for ALS. The Institute has identified AT-1501, an antibody therapeutic that has shown more promise to cure ALS in preclinical trials than any other compound. Headed by skilled scientists and people with ALS, the Institute has conducted extensive research into the disease and is steadily bringing the world closer to curing it.