The ALS Association endorses the strengthened Accelerating Access to Critical Therapies for ALS Act (ACT) for ALS Act (H.R.8662/ S. 4867) as an important step in bringing promising new treatments to people with ALS as quickly as possible. The bill accelerates the fight against ALS by authorizing $100 million for ALS research and creating the first federal entity explicitly charged with developing treatments for neurodegenerative diseases.

Today, in response to the New England Journal of Medicine publication of encouraging clinical trial results showing that Amylyx Pharmaceuticals’ AMX0035 brought statistically significant benefit to people living with ALS, The ALS Association and I AM ALS immediately called on the drug company and the FDA to make the treatment widely available as soon as possible.

The ALS Association strongly supports initiatives to enable people with ALS to access promising treatments as soon as possible, including prior to FDA approval. Our primary goal is to facilitate the development of effective treatments and help support delivery to everyone with ALS as soon as possible.

The ALS Association and I AM ALS announced today that the organizations have awarded a combined grant of $500,000 to BrainStorm Cell Therapeutics (NASDAQ: BCLI), a biotechnology company, to support an amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) biomarker research study. The grant will be used to draw insights from data and samples collected from patients enrolled in BrainStorm’s ongoing phase 3 clinical trial of its NurOwn® treatment, to further understanding of critical biomarkers associated with treatment response for people with ALS.

The ALS Association, in partnership with the American Brain Foundation and the American Academy of Neurology, has awarded the 2020 Sheila Essey Award for ALS research to Guy Rouleau, M.D., Ph.D., director of the Montreal Neurological Institute and Hospital and chair of the Department of Neurology and Neurosurgery at McGill University. The award recognizes significant research contributions in the search for the cause, prevention of and cure for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). Since 1996, The ALS Association and the American Academy of Neurology have jointly chosen recipients of the award.

The ALS Association today announced a three-year, $652,543 commitment to support new collaborative initiatives that will encourage therapeutic pipeline development, improve ALS trial efficiency and quality, and enhance the patient experience with trial access, recruitment, and retention efforts. Activities will take place at the Sean M. Healey & AMG Center for ALS at Mass General in collaboration with the Barrow Neurological Institute and the Northeast ALS Consortium (NEALS).

The ALS Association today announced a $3 million commitment to the first platform trial for ALS, taking place at the Sean M. Healey & AMG Center for ALS at Mass General in collaboration with the Barrow Neurological Institute and the Northeast ALS Consortium (NEALS). A "platform trial" is a clinical trial in which multiple treatments are tested and evaluated simultaneously. The Association’s commitment is $1 million per year for 3 years.

The ALS Association is partnering with, and will be directly investing in, the ALS Investment Fund II to raise $100 million to accelerate investment in ALS research and development. This second venture fund with offices in Boston and Amsterdam, succeeds a fund that started in The Netherlands and raised $25 million in two-and-a-half years to invest in companies with ALS initiatives. 

An independent research organization reported that donations from the 2014 ALS Ice Bucket Challenge enabled The ALS Association to increase its annual funding for research around the world by 187 percent. During this time, ALS researchers made scientific advances, care for people living with ALS expanded and investment in disease research from the federal government grew.

The ALS Association, the only national nonprofit fighting amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) on every front, applauded the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) announcement today that it has approved Radicava (edaravone), the first new treatment approved specifically for ALS in 22 years. The FDA approved Radicava less than a year after Mitsubishi Tanabe Pharma Corporation submitted a New Drug Application. There are only two other approved treatments specifically for ALS, Riluzole and Tiglutik.