[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 146 (2000), Part 12]
[House]
[Page 17221]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



                       EYE DEGENERATIVE DISEASES

  (Ms. ROS-LEHTINEN asked and was given permission to address the House 
for 1 minute and to revise and extend her remarks.)
  Ms. ROS-LEHTINEN. Mr. Speaker, Isaac, Daria, and Ilana Lidsky, young 
constituents from my congressional district, are three of the 
approximately 6 million people who have retinal degenerative diseases. 
Along with their parents, Betti and Carlos, the Lidsky family works 
tirelessly to raise research funds for eye degenerative diseases. This 
Saturday, the Lidskys will hold their annual dinner which has helped 
make possible unprecedented medical advances.
  In a groundbreaking study, supported by the Foundation Fighting 
Blindness, scientists amazingly restored vision in a mouse using oral 
doses of a chemical compound derived from vitamin A. This miracle 
offers evidence that researchers will soon be able to develop similar 
cures for patients with retinitis pigmentosa, macular degeneration, and 
other retinal degenerative diseases which may lead to blindness.
  Now more than ever, in an effort to make these treatments available, 
we need to support funding for the National Eye Institute so that our 
Nation's researchers will have the resources needed to make sight-
debilitating diseases extinct.
  Mr. Speaker, this Sunday, CBS's ``60 Minutes'' will highlight the 
Lidskys' uplifting story, and I urge my colleagues to tune in and learn 
what each of us can do in order to help realize a cure soon.

                          ____________________