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WOTD: Oneirogmophobia



 
 
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Old January 4th 08, 03:03 AM posted to rec.pets.dogs.behavior,rec.pets.dogs,alt.usenet.legends.lester-mosley
marika[_2_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 23
Default WOTD: Oneirogmophobia

does anyone suffer from anosmia?
does it prevent you from being a good pet owner?

"marika" wrote in message news:...

"帅有什么用?脸能当信用卡刷吗?" wrote in message
...


A week ago, I awoke from a dream in which everyone in the world had
become
anosmic...it took me several minutes to prove to myself that I
wasn't....r


hehe


My sister has been anosmic her entire life. Lots of funny stories about
it.

Here's a note she sent me about it recently


----- Original Message -----
From: "marika"
Newsgroups:
alt.music.operation-ivy,alt.usenet.legends.lester-mosley,alt.tcs.must.die.die.die
Sent: Thursday, December 27, 2007 8:36 PM
Subject: sensual hit me


my sister said

Great!.... something to really look forward to when I get old.

Though I have caught brief whiffs of roses and gasoline (when I know that
it's right under my nose, and I can see it, and I am told "this smells")
I don't think I could actually blind-identify any of these, even if you
held a gun to my head. And rarely can I tell what smells "good" vs what
smells "bad". I'd even go so far as to change "rarely" to "never", unless
someone tells me exactly what it is and/or I actually see it myself.
(It's all visual.) But I couldn't tell a closed box of roses from a
closed box of dog poop, if I tried.

on­ion, lem­on, cin­na­mon, black pep­per, choc­o­late, rose, ba­nana,
pine­ap­ple, soap, paint thin­ner, gas­o­line and smoke.
I can't even identify any of these in food, unless you tell me they're in
there, and then it's sort of "Oh....yeah."
Especially stuff like "fruit FLAVORED", where the texture is not
available for a clue. Forget about it. I go 100% on color, texture and
product label.
You could dye lemonade dark red and tell me it's cherry juice.... I'd
believe you.
I ate an entire bowl of mint ice cream once (which I allegedly hate)
because someone told me it was vanilla yogurt, and I had no idea, they
told me after I finished eating it. It was white (not green) so how the
hell would I know? I thought all mint ice cream is green.

Though, interestingly, I was in a clothing store the other day, and a
60ish yr old Russian lady was standing right next to me going through the
clothing racks, and I thought I was gonna faint. I think she smelled, but
I am not positive, because mostly it just registered as nausea to me, and
it made my eyes water, rather than any identifiable smell. Everytime I
tried to move away from her, she stepped closer to me. This went on for
about 10 minutes before I finally had to leave the store because she was
giving me such a headache. I don't know what it was.... food? soap?
perfume? body odor? dead carcass in her purse? Who knows, but whatever it
was, it made me sick.

"marika" wrote in message news:...
As far as I know, the buthers senses of smell & taste are fine.




----- Original Message -----
From: "marika"
Newsgroups: alt.atixzuwe.mi.us,alt.usenet.legends.lester-mosley
Sent: Thursday, December 06, 2007 11:48 AM
Subject: the first pbrs


I know Holly Go Lightly was not involved with stem cell research...
(I know genentech is, and I remember Julia'sconnection)

SELLING SCIENTIFIC PROMISE
A desperate injection of stem cells and hope


By Alan Zarembo, Times Staff Writer


Alone at his computer, drool sliding down his chin, Tom Hill searched
the
Internet for anything that could save him.


His 55-year-old body was gradually shutting down. His muscles twitched
uncontrollably. He could no longer talk, so he scribbled notes to
communicate with his wife, Valerie.


Seven months earlier, he had been diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral
sclerosis, also known as ALS or Lou Gehrig's disease an incurable
deterioration of the nervous system that spares the cognitive parts of
the
brain, leaving its victims sharply aware as they slowly die.


The doctors told him there was no way to reverse the disease no
drugs, no
surgeries, no other therapies.


Tom refused to listen.


He had been a successful real estate developer in Atlanta, a hard
charger
who always got things done his way.


Now, he spent most of his time in a makeshift study above the garage,
searching hour after hour.


Valerie could hear Tom's muffled movements. She rarely interrupted him.
After nearly 29 years of marriage, it pained her to see him like this.


She knew there was little hope, but there was no point in arguing. She
threw
herself into the final preparations for their daughter's wedding and
left
Tom alone to search.


In the spring of 2003, he found http://www.biomark-intl.com .


BioMark International offered a stem cell injection for a variety of
illnesses, including Parkinson's disease, muscular dystrophy,
depression and
ALS.


"All ALS research now cites the promise of stem cells as the only
answer,"
the website said.


Tom had been reading about stem cells for months and knew them to be
the
next frontier of medicine, the primordial cells that could become
unblemished tissue of any type. He was convinced they could replace the
deteriorating nerve cells in his body.


He pored over BioMark's material, dozens of pages of patient
testimonials,
scientific references and news reports on the vast promise of stem
cells.


Could this be his chance to be reborn?


Valerie could hear her husband's printer churning out page after page.


"It is worth a try," he scrawled in the margin of one printout.


ENTREPRENEURS ON SCIENCE'S FRONTIER


Tom Hill was just the type of patient BioMark was looking for.


The company was launched in the summer of 2002, less than a year before
Tom
found its website. It began small, in a rented condominium shared by
its
founders, Laura Brown and Steve van Rooyen, just a few miles from Tom's
house.


At first, the company survived patient to patient, each paying as much
as
$21,000 per treatment.


Word was spreading. It was a good time for a stem cell business.


The once exotic science was in the news almost daily. In August 2001,
President Bush allotted federal funds for stem cell research but said
they
could not be spent on the study and development of new lines of cells
from
human embryos. It was a compromise to address the concerns of religious
conservatives and others who opposed any destruction of human embryos.


The restrictions came under attack from high-profile figures, including
former First Lady Nancy Reagan and actor Christopher Reeve, fomenting a
national debate that turned "stem cell" into a household term.


Reports of each new scientific advance circulated rapidly in the
media and
on Internet message boards for people with incurable diseases. Stem
cell
clinics began popping up in China, Ukraine, Barbados and other places.


Brown and Van Rooyen built their business on the idea that science had
already proved the therapeutic power of stem cells. BioMark was simply
making it available to the world.


The company had a scientific advisory board, a professional-looking
website
and doctors to administer the therapy in Atlanta.


"When something this powerful, this beautiful, is laid in your hands,
in
your path, you give everything you have to it," Brown said in an
interview
with The Times last fall.


At least 220 patients had received BioMark injections, she said.


The therapy, as advertised, was simple: an injection of 1.5 million
stem
cells in the abdomen. Everybody got the same type of cells, regardless
of
their disease.


"Once in the body, cells migrate to the site of the disease and begin
producing the needed cells," explained a BioMark information packet.


BioMark cells, Brown told patients, were free from the "right-to-life
issues" slowing the development of stem cell cures in the U.S. The
cells did
not come from embryos, but from blood harvested from umbilical cords
after
childbirth.


One BioMark brochure carried a disclaimer that the treatment was not
approved by the Food and Drug Administration.


But some patients saw that as a badge of honor. Someone was working to
help
them, even if that help ran afoul of the government.


It infuriated Tom that politics had trumped science.


"People suffering from disease are told they have to wait for their
cures,"
he wrote in a letter to his U.S. senators. "Many of these patients do
not
have time to wait and a research delay could be a death sentence."


Tom created a website to protest the federal restrictions. After 25
years as
a Republican, he renounced his party membership.


He told Valerie about BioMark and instructed her not to tell his
doctors.


She didn't know what to make of all this. She had never heard of anyone
being cured of ALS, and she gingerly questioned his plan.


Tom stabbed at the keys on his voice synthesizer. An electronic retort
pulsed back at her: "I've done a lot of research."


He felt su This was science.


A DISCOVERY WITH GREAT PROMISE


It began 50 years ago with the discovery of an odd lump on the scrotum
of a
lab mouse.


Researchers at the Jackson Laboratory in Bar Harbor, Maine, were
investigating whether cigarette paper could cause cancer. One lab mouse
had
an unusual tumor.


Most tumors are made up of one type of tissue that grows out of
control. But
this one was a grotesque clump of budding muscle, bone, nerves and fat.


It was biology gone haywire.


After many experiments, the scientists found a smattering of unfamiliar
cells mixed in this mad stew of life.


These tumor cells, they surmised, were transforming into other tissue
types.


The cells gave scientists a chance to look at one of the most
mysterious
processes of life.


All the complexity of the human body hearts, lungs, brains, limbs
starts
from a single fertilized egg. As it divides, an unknown set of
biochemical
signals tells the multiplying cells to differentiate into the diverse
tissues of the body.


When the cells are primitive, they have the ability to become any
tissue
"pluripotent" in medical terminology.


The mouse tumors offered a crude glimpse of these "stem cells" and
their
power to transform.


It would be decades before researchers possessed the technology to find
them
in embryos.


In 1981, scientists isolated embryonic stem cells in mice and
successfully
grew them into a kind of suspended animation in which the cells would
indefinitely divide but not differentiate.


They later found that slight chemical changes could make the cells
suddenly
transform into a mishmash of tissue.


It took 17 more years before researchers at the University of Wisconsin
isolated the cells from days-old human embryos.


The floodgates of medical fantasy were thrown open.


If scientists could decode the complex series of biochemical signals
used to
command the cells, they could create any type of tissue.


Doctors could grow new nerve fibers to patch a severed spine. They
could
make new organs to replace damaged ones without fear of tissue
rejections.
They could grow brain cells to help patients with Alzheimer's disease.


Science has made some progress.


At the National Institutes of Health, mouse embryonic stem cells were
transformed into neurons that made the brain chemical dopamine. The new
cells were used to treat symptoms of Parkinson's disease in rats.


At Stanford University, the same type of cells was used to make
insulin-producing cells that kept diabetic mice alive.


At UC Irvine, human embryonic stem cells were transformed into
nerve-wrapping cells known as oligodendrocytes, which helped rats with
spinal cord injuries.


But scientists say the complex biochemistry of humans means that
medical
therapies are years, if not decades, away. Therapies could lead to
cancer if
the stem cells migrate to the wrong place.


There are currently no trials underway for human therapies using
embryonic
stem cells in the U.S.


"It's still in its infancy," said Gail Martin, a developmental
biologist
at
UC San Francisco who was one of the first scientists to isolate
embryonic
stem cells in mice.


A CONFIDENT MAN, A CONFIDENT PATIENT


Valerie had never really noticed how life was balanced on a knife
point,
ready to topple her into darkness at any moment.


She was a 23-year-old stewardess for Delta Airlines when Tom spotted
her at
a wedding in 1973. Eleven months later they were married and on the
path
to the good life they both wanted.


Over the next three decades, they built a house in one of the toniest
Atlanta suburbs, bought a vacation home on nearby Lake Burton, joined a
country club and took ski trips to Aspen. Their two children attended
private schools. Tom pushed hard for these things.


He was always so sure. That was one of the things that had attracted
Valerie. He had a smooth, confident voice that put people at ease.


His voice was the first thing to go.


Valerie noticed in the spring of 2002 that his speech had begun to slur
ever
so slightly sometimes, as if he were drunk. She hoped the doctors were
right, that he was suffering from allergies or stress from his
business.


In October, a doctor told her that Tom probably had no more than a few
years
to live. She let out a scream. The doctor put her on an antidepressant.


Tom had bulbar ALS. The disease starts in the cranial nerves that
control
the lower face, tongue and palate, reaching the vital organs more
quickly
than a slower-killing variety that starts in the limbs.


Tom approached his illness like another real estate deal.


Early on, he walked into the office of Dr. Jonathan Glass, a
neurologist who
heads the ALS Center at Emory University, and announced: "I'm going to
help
you cure me by raising millions of dollars for your research."


Valerie didn't want to stand in his way. Still, there were so many
things to
do and talk about in the time Tom had left. There was their daughter's
upcoming wedding, and plans for their son, who was in college.


Tom didn't want to discuss those things.


One day, he presented Valerie with a stack of printouts on BioMark.


The information seemed to make sense until she started reading the
patient
testimonials. One stood out: a 26-year-old ALS patient who had added 20
pounds of muscle in the two weeks after his treatment. "He feels
incredible
and is regaining strength," it said.


Valerie was dumbfounded. "This is a joke," she said. "If this is
true, then
everybody should be doing it around the world."


But it was futile to argue with Tom and always had been.


He was taking 28 pills and lozenges a day. No therapy seemed too
outlandish.
He tried curative magnetic insoles. He spent two weeks in Tijuana
getting
ozone treatments that were supposed to remove toxins from his body.


By the spring of 2003, he had dropped to 146 pounds, down from his
healthy
172.


There was still time for hope. In June he summoned the energy to walk
his
daughter, Meredith, down the aisle at her wedding. He danced with her
to the
song "My Girl" while tearful guests looked on at the reception.


Tom threw himself into setting up a BioMark injection.


"They normally charge $21,000 but they want to be listed on my
website,"
he
wrote on a notepad.


He got the fee down to $10,000.


At least he had bargained, thought Valerie, who was starting to worry
about
all the money that seemed to be disappearing into a black hole of
cure-alls.


On July 18, Tom received an e-mail from BioMark. For the time being,
the
closest place he could receive an injection was Toronto.


"I Am spending so much for my HEALTH NOW," Tom wrote on instructions to
wire
the $10,000 to BioMark's account at Bank of America in Atlanta.


The next week, Tom and Valerie flew to Toronto and took a taxi to a
clinic.
In the waiting room, Dr. Christopher Goddard was finishing up with
another
patient, a man with multiple sclerosis who had just received an
injection.


For the next hour and a half, Valerie grilled the doctor about his
credentials and the treatment. He told her he was a physician with a
doctorate who worked at Lifebank Cryogenics Corp., a Canadian company
that
stores umbilical cord blood. BioMark paid him to fly from Vancouver,
British
Columbia, to administer the injections.


There was still time to back out and get their money returned.


Valerie looked at Tom hunched in a wheelchair. She knew this was his
last
hope.


"No, we'll do it," she said.


Valerie was still skeptical, but she felt a little better. Goddard
seemed to
know what he was talking about.


The stem cells could be injected into a vein, which BioMark said would
bring
the biggest results in three months, or into the fat of the abdomen for
improvements that would come later but last longer.


Tom decided he would split the cells and do it both ways.


From the week he was diagnosed, he had told everybody that he would
survive.
He had fought so hard. This was a cure whose power nobody could deny.


At that moment, Valerie decided to duck out for a quick lunch.


Alone with the doctor, Tom felt the sting of two needles. In a few
minutes,
it was over.


Restoration had begun, he thought.


BIOMARK'S PLAN TAKES SHAPE


Laura Vanessa Brown, a co-founder of BioMark International, is 34 years
old,
tall, thin and blond.


"My background wouldn't naturally point me in this direction," she
said in a
telephone interview from a location she refused to specify. "I modeled
for
a
long time."


Her father, Douglas Brown, an investment advisor in Waxhaw, N.C., said
that
Laura's job as a runway model sent her around the world through much of
the
1990s. He said that she grew interested in nutrition and alternative
medicine while watching her weight.


Laura Brown double-majored in speech and in radio and television at the
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She said her science
education
came unconventionally.


"I got to do a lot of studying and reading and writing while I was
bouncing
around not using my brain for work," she said.


In the late 1990s, she said, she landed in Los Angeles and studied
yoga.


There, she met Steve van Rooyen. He had no science degree either, Brown
said.


They became partners and headed to Atlanta in 2002 to work with
Mitchell
Ghen, an osteopath who had once treated Brown's father and had become
interested in stem cells from umbilical cord blood.


But after a few months, the pair broke away to form BioMark, eventually
relocating to an apartment in Miami Beach.


They worked hard to build their business, visiting doctors and
alternative
medicine practitioners to explain their treatment.


Dr. Alawode Oladele, an Atlanta oncologist, said he met with Brown at
an
Atlanta hotel, where she questioned him about cancer treatments.


Brown told him that BioMark had a team of scientists and reams of
unpublished data showing the effectiveness of its treatment. Oladele
was
impressed.


That was the last he heard from BioMark.


Later, he was perplexed to see himself listed on BioMark's website as a
member of the scientific advisory board. He found it odd but figured it
didn't really hurt him.


Five other people said they were also surprised to find themselves
posted as
scientific advisors.


BioMark sent blood to Howard Wajchman, an Atlanta immunologist, who
said he
isolated the stem cells and sent them to doctors working with the
company.


Dr. Dowman Covington, who worked at an Atlanta clinic, said Brown and
Van
Rooyen convinced him that a 1997 Georgia law the Access to Medical
Treatment Act would allow him to try experimental therapies for
people
with incurable illnesses.


One of his first patients, he said, was Laura Brown, who wanted the
cells as
an anti-aging treatment. It was reassuring that Brown seemed to believe
so
strongly in the therapy.


Covington said he injected 46 patients for multiple sclerosis, ALS and
cancer, receiving $300 or $400 per patient.


But after several months, he became suspicious when BioMark sent him a
patient with a severed spinal cord, a condition that he saw no point in
treating with the cells. He stopped working with the company in the
spring
of 2003.


BioMark started sending Atlanta patients to a clinic in Canada.


In October, the family of Craig Lauver, an ALS patient in Mifflintown,
Pa.,
who was convinced that a BioMark injection could cure him, called the
FDA
with concerns about the company.


The FDA began a fraud investigation, persuading the Lauver family to
help
set up an undercover operation. Craig Lauver's brother, Nelson, said he
asked BioMark to send somebody to inject the cells.


When a BioMark representative arrived from Arizona on Nov. 14, an FDA
agent
was there posing as Nelson's business colleague. The representative
talked
about the therapy, while two FDA agents in a bedroom controlled a video
camera hidden in a lamp. After about 20 minutes, they entered the
living
room and pulled out their badges.


The FDA questioned and released the BioMark representative.


The same day, the FDA raided BioMark's office in Miami Beach, according
to
an e-mail the company sent to a patient.


The FDA froze BioMark's Bank of America accounts, which held
$264,554.12,
court documents show.


The company was shut down, but on the Internet it still looked like a
thriving business. The website was dense with links to news articles
about
stem cells and diseases. The words "BioTech Advances" were bannered
across
the top, alongside the image of somebody peering into a microscope. A
DNA
double-helix spiraled down the left. There were links for "Research and
Development," "Scientific Support" and "Testimonials."


Research by Catherine Verfaillie, the website said, proved the power of
BioMark stem cells.


But Verfaillie, director of the Stem Cell Institute at the University
of
Minnesota, explained in a March 2004 letter to the FDA that her work
had
been misrepresented.


"The information has no scientific credibility and it may mislead
people who
are seeking treatment and cures for serious diseases," she wrote of the
BioMark website.


Several stem cell experts who reviewed the website for the Los Angeles
Times
agreed.


Cord blood stem cells have been used to treat some blood diseases and
to
rebuild the blood-forming system after chemotherapy. But scientists
doubt
they would be useful for neurological diseases because current evidence
suggests that any ability to transform into non-blood cells is limited.


On the Internet, satisfied BioMark customers described improvements,
such as
smoother skin, better sleep and more energy sometimes within hours of
their injections. Scientists leave open the possibility that the
patients
are experiencing more than the placebo effect, but without controlled
clinical trials it is difficult to know what is happening.


"This is just evil," said Lawrence Goldstein, a professor of cellular
and
molecular medicine at UC San Diego School of Medicine.


Dr. Irving Weissman, a Stanford University professor and the first
person to
isolate blood-forming stem cells, concluded: "It's totally disgusting."


After the FDA search, Brown and Van Rooyen left the United States.


WAITING FOR THE CELLS TO WORK


Amonth after his injection, Tom swore that it was easier to close his
mouth.


Valerie was skeptical, but Tom told her to be patient. "Six to eight
weeks,"
he would say, echoing BioMark's claims about how long it would take to
start
seeing the biggest benefits.


By the two-month mark, his breathing had plunged to 46% of normal.


When Tom could no longer climb the stairs to his office, he spent his
days
in a living room recliner, a computer in his lap.


His son, Thomas, had taken the year off from college to help care for
his
father. Thomas struggled now to transfer him in and out of the lift
installed in the stairwell. His father's body was turning to dead
weight.


At this late stage, Valerie wished that Tom could help patch the holes
of
their life apologies, advice for their children, regrets, kind words
that
could help her carry on without him.


She begged him to make peace with his life.


"Why are you so mean to me?" Tom typed on his synthesizer. "You want
me to
die soon."


"No, we want you to talk with us," Valerie said. "Isn't there
something you
want to tell us?"


Tom just shook his head.


She asked whether he wanted to be buried or cremated. He turned up the
volume on the television to drown her out.


One night Tom plowed his wheelchair into furniture, knocking over lamps
and
chairs. Valerie called the police, telling them that he had tried to
ram
into her too.


After that, she refused to guard his secrets and told Dr. Glass about
the
stem cell treatment.


The neurologist understood. Tom was not his only patient who had sought
unproven stem cell therapies abroad.


Valerie asked a lay minister from her church to talk with her each
week.


All that fall, a pungent odor wafted through the house a brew of
Chinese
herbs that Tom poured into his feeding tube.


In early November, Tom received an e-mail from BioMark stating that the
board of directors wanted to offer him a second treatment. He would
only be
required to pay about $1,000.


"Please do not contact them and tell them it doesn't work," Tom typed
in a
message to Valerie. "I need anything now to help me and I will try
anything."


Perhaps the first stem cell injection just needed a boost. He was ready
to
wire the money as soon as BioMark scheduled an appointment.


Then the news arrived. Tom showed Valerie the e-mail from the FDA.
BioMark
was under investigation for fraud.


"I guess you won't be going for that second treatment," Valerie told
Tom.


He lowered his head.


He still believed in BioMark, but there was nothing he could do on his
own.
Valerie could barely listen to him anymore.


She dug up the number for the Canadian doctor who had injected Tom, and
demanded a refund.


Dr. Goddard sent $1,920, which he told her was his fee from BioMark. He
did
not return several phone calls from The Times.


The money arrived with a note saying, "I love my patients." There was
also a
book, the 1969 classic by Dr. Elisabeth Kubler-Ross, "On Death and
Dying."


Valerie glanced at the book and deposited the money.


A RESOLUTION WITH NO PEACE


On March 23, 2004, Tom Hill died at Haven House Hospice in Atlanta. He
was
56.


At a memorial service at Northside United Methodist Church, old friends
spoke about their fraternity days at the University of Georgia. The
minister
remembered how happy Tom had been to walk his daughter down the aisle
at her
wedding.


Valerie decided to have his body cremated. Half his ashes were
scattered on
Lake Burton. Valerie plans to disperse the rest in a memorial garden at
their church. For now, they are on a shelf in his office, surrounded by
pictures of the multimillion-dollar office complexes he had built
around
Atlanta.


Two months after Tom died, Valerie put a recording of his memorial
service
into a cassette player at home. The last two years had nearly destroyed
her
memories of their marriage. The old stories helped. She replayed the
tape
every few days.


"Eventually, I'll hopefully be able to remember the good times," she
said.


She has begun training to become a Stephen Minister, a church counselor
like
the woman who had helped her through Tom's final months.


The FDA recently sent her a check for $6,896, part of the money the
government seized from BioMark. The company remains under
investigation.


One afternoon in December, Valerie returned home to find a message on
her
answering machine from BioMark.


It was for Tom.


Valerie didn't know it, but the company had set up an office in London
and
found doctors in Tijuana and Rotterdam, the Netherlands, to start
administering their injections again. It set up a Swiss bank account to
receive payments from patients.


The caller said she would phone back but never did.


A NEW SEARCH FOR HOPE


The patients arrive every few weeks at the Corporativo Oncologico in
Tijuana
Americans slumped in wheelchairs, hobbling on crutches or carried by
loved
ones toward the stem cells inside.


The clinic's main business is providing low-cost radiation treatments.
But
recently Dr. Armando Garcia, the head of the clinic, began
administering
stem cells for BioMark.


He stepped into the waiting room with an orange-and-white bag labeled
"biohazard." He reached into the bag and pulled out a frosted vial.


"These cells are very good," he said.


Marsha Weeks arrived from Anacortes, Wash., in September, hoping to
ease her
bouts of pain from multiple sclerosis. Living on Social Security, the
29-year-old single mother maxed out her credit cards to pay for a
single
$10,000 treatment.


A few weeks later, 25-year-old Richard Welsh leaned into his crutches
and
ascended the ramp to the clinic. He prayed the cells could repair his
spinal
cord, crushed in a car accident five years earlier.


His hometown, Klemme, Iowa, had rallied behind him. A dentist donated
electric toothbrushes for a fundraiser. The local Wal-Mart chipped in
$750.


Greg Evans journeyed to Tijuana from Robesonia, Pa., hoping to save his
only
child. Eleven-year-old David was withering from Duchenne muscular
dystrophy,
a fatal degenerative disease.


"We're staking our lives on this working," Evans said.


http://www.latimes.com/news/na­ti...e­lls20feb2...
130.story






 




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