When RARE cannot be “cured”

 
The  image above – of virtually all the big pharma companies – illustrates who is funding the Rare Disease Day activities I will attend after my week at NIH doing the Natural History Study for Moebius syndrome. The fact that rare and pharma are so intertwined creates interesting challenges for those of us affected by conditions that you cannot “cure”.
In med-speak, I have congenital anomalities. No pharmaceutical agent will make my nerves work right. Therefore, I am terribly uninteresting to most pharma companies. Not saying that I don’t rely on meds to keep me breathing and functioning, because I do… but there is no hope for a breakthrough cure that can be splashed over mainstream media and lauded by the lay community.

Answers to the causes behind Moebius syndrome have been slow to come, and when they do (I hope they do!) we don’t know what we’ll be able to “do” with that information. Maybe stem cells. Maybe something that has yet to be invented.

I should be thankful there isn’t a necessary rush to develop treatments, but when I hear of people in the Moebius community facing serious respiratory problems that can be fatal…a little part of me wishes we could find a big pharma company to take us on as their pet project and develop something amazing.

But first we need to know WHY.