To the Editor:
I am raising awareness for multiple sclerosis and have been for the past several years. Multiple sclerosis, better known as MS, is an unpredictable, often disabling disease of the central nervous system. It interrupts the flow of information within the brain and between the brain and body. Symptoms vary by patient, but can range from numbness and tingling to blindness and paralysis. It affects more than 400,000 people in the United States.
No one has chosen to live with MS, it has chosen us and we choose to fight it. I am asking you join me in the fight against MS, now during MS Awareness Month, and throughout the year to make sure the voices of everyone connected to MS are heard.
Our bodies are in constant motion – moving information from the brain to the body. MS stops people from moving by attacking the myelin that protects normal nerve tissue. The damage keeps people from moving smoothly, both inside and out. Many have trouble imagining what their lives would be without the ability to move, but I know the effects of MS and I have MS.
March 1, I will once again take the initiative to attend the Carroll County Commissioners meeting and speak with them regarding MS. In return, I ask they accept a proclamation I constructed to recognize Carroll County as one of the counties in Ohio proclaiming March as MS Awareness Month in Ohio as was signed into law by former Governor Robert Taft March 2, 2006.
March of this year will be another stepping stone with MS as it has been announced a new FDA approved oral medication, Ampyra, will be introduced. Currently, the only prescribed MS medications are administered by shot injections. The information obtained about Ampyra indicates the active ingredient is a sustained-release formula of 4-aminopyriding, which blocks tiny pores on the surface of nerve fibers. This blocking ability may improve the transmission of signals in nerve fibers whose insulating myelin coating has been damaged by MS. No information about the cost of the drug has been released.
If you have multiple sclerosis, if you know someone who has MS or if you want to help the 18,000 Ohioans who battle the disease every day, I ask for your help in raising awareness. We fight MS because this is a battle we can, and should, win. We fight MS right now so future generations won’t have to.
Information on MS and awareness events can be located at the National Multiple Sclerosis, Ohio Buckeye Chapter, website www.nationalmssociety.org/chapters/OH.
Carroll County MS Activist
Edward L. Hale
Carrollton, OH
<<Back>> |
