Antisense: World Duchenne Awareness Day - 7 September
- ANP to participate in US-based Jett Foundation’s World Duchenne Awareness Day Celebrations
September 7 is World Duchenne Awareness Day. It is held on the 7th day of the 9th month because the DMD gene consists of 79 exons. Every year the World Duchenne Organisation announces a theme for the day and this year the theme is “Adult life & Duchenne”.
"One in 3,500 to 5,000 newborn boys in the world are diagnosed with the rare and fatal disease: Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD). While it is a rare condition, the 250,000 patients around the globe think big and have big dreams. Duchenne Parents have set up organisations in their countries, and all of them work day by day to find access to care, to improve research, to educate patients and families." https://www.worldduchenneday.org/
Antisense Therapeutics Limited (“ANP” or “the Company”) is proud to be supporting the US-based Jett Foundation’s World Duchenne Awareness Day Celebration on 7 September 2021 and to have Dr Gil Price, ANP’s US-based Consultant Medical Director attend the event on behalf of the Company to engage with patients and families as well as industry participants.
For the past 5 years, Jett Foundation has hosted this annual event of celebration and remembrance in the Boston area, the epicenter for rare disease research. In recognition of this annual worldwide day dedicated to Duchenne muscular dystrophy, Jett Foundation brings local patients and families, Duchenne experts, and industry partners together to celebrate advances made in Duchenne research, and to acknowledge the challenges still to come.
The Jett Foundation’s 2021 World Duchenne Awareness Day virtual celebration (https://www.jettfoundation.org/wdad) will take place in the homes of families, clinicians, advocates and industry partners everywhere. The celebration will include a series of at-home activities and online live and recorded activities. Participants will have the opportunity to join the day’s scheduled events or participate on their own time.
If you would like to support this cause in Australia please visit the Save our Sons Duchenne Foundation https://saveoursons.org.au/pages/duchenne-awareness-day
For more information please contact:
Antisense Therapeutics
Mark Diamond
Managing Director & CEO
+61 (0)3 9827 8999
Investment Enquiries
Gennadi Koutchin
XEC Partners
1300 932 037
About Antisense Therapeutics Limited
(ASX:ANP | US OTC:ATHJY) is an Australian publicly listed biotechnology company, developing and commercializing antisense pharmaceuticals for large unmet markets in rare diseases. The products are in-licensed from Ionis Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ: IONS), an established leader in antisense drug development. The Company is developing ATL1102, an antisense inhibitor of the CD49d receptor, for Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) patients and recently reported highly promising Phase II trial results. ATL1102 has also successfully completed a Phase II efficacy and safety trial, significantly reducing the number of brain lesions in patients with relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis (RRMS). The Company has a second drug, ATL1103 designed to block GHr production that successfully reduced blood IGF-I levels in Phase II clinical trials in patients with the growth disorder acromegaly.
About ATL1102
ATL1102 is an antisense inhibitor of CD49d, a subunit of VLA-4 (Very Late Antigen-4). Antisense inhibition of VLA-4 expression has demonstrated activity in a number of animal models of inflammatory disease. ATL1102 has also shown to be very effective in reducing inflammatory brain lesions in a patients with MS (Limmroth, V. et al Neurology, 2014; 83(20): 1780-1788) and recently delivered highly promising clinical results in patients with Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) a rare and fatal muscle wasting disease where inflammation in the muscle leads to fibrosis and death of muscle tissue.
About Jett Foundation
Jett Foundation aims to extend and enrich the lives of individuals affected by Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) and other neuromuscular disorders. It seeks to fulfil this mission by partnering with individuals and families through empowering educational programming, transformational direct service experiences, and by accelerating the development of life-changing treatments.
More than 60% of the patients and families served by Jett Foundation are non-ambulatory, representing thousands of families in the United States. Many of Jett Foundation’s direct-service programs, including Camp Promise and Jett Giving Fund, are specifically targeted to families with non-ambulatory boys as they often need more assistance and have fewer options for support than younger children.
Jett Foundation’s events provide opportunities for industry partners to hear directly from DMD community to gain a better understanding and insight into current issues and themes, conflicts and challenges faced, and the overall burden of disease that one experiences with COVID-19 and Duchenne muscular dystrophy.
About Save Our Sons Duchenne Foundation
Save Our Sons Duchenne Foundation was founded in 2008 and is the peak body for those living with Duchenne and Becker muscular dystrophy (around 1,000 young people) across Australia.
Its vision is to find a cure for Duchenne and Becker muscular dystrophy whilst actively working to ensure enhanced quality of life (including quality of educational opportunities) for those young people and their families affected by this condition.
Advocacy and community engagement work are crucial to achieving this vision along with ongoing fundraising designed to raise funds for essential research, service delivery and the provision of critical resources to the Duchenne and Becker community.
Along with the funding of a critical nurses program in some of the major children’s hospitals across Australia, Save Our Sons Duchenne Foundation also delivers a telehealth nursing service, scholarship programs, critical equipment and resources and a number of initiatives and programs such as music therapy which are designed to enhance the quality of life, skills and social development of young people suffering from Duchenne and Becker.
