[Life expectancy for people with FOP is] tremendously variable, ... The average life span is mid-40s, but it ranges from the teens to the 80s. |
[Several proteins have been identified as vital for bone growth, including one called BMP4.] We know BMP4 is one of the terrorist agents that triggers new bone formation, ... We're working on therapies to limit the production of BMP4 in people who have FOP. |
Even if the answer to FOP is only for FOP, it wouldn't in any way dissuade me from working on it, ... I would hope we can make a difference for these kids (and find) medications, treatment or therapy that would enable them to prevent a joint from turning into bone or restore movement to some joint already frozen. |
Generally, though, these people are quite healthy, ... Perhaps there is an auto-inflammatory component because they tend to be tremendously resistant to infections. But if they happen to get a cold or respiratory infection, it's more likely to become a complicated issue. |
President Bush is going to begin withdrawing troops from Iraq. That no longer seems in doubt. The question is: How does he plan to do it? Which troops will come out first? How quickly? Where will they go? Under what circumstances will they be put back in? Which troops will remain, and what will they do? How will they keep a profile low enough to make the Iraqi government seem genuinely autonomous yet high enough to help deter or stave off internal threats? Who will keep the borders secure, a task for which the Iraqi army doesn't even pretend to have the slightest capability? What kinds of diplomatic arrangements will he make with Iraq's neighbors -- who have their own conflicting interests in the country's future -- to assure an international peace? |
That can send the condition into a wild state of flare-up. |
The real question, which will be answered in the next couple of months, is whether the combatants in this phase of the Iraqi warthe Sunnis vs. the Shiites, mainlyare ready to agree on a framework. |
The Wizards of Armageddon. |
These people are literally imprisoned in a second skeleton, ... It transforms muscles, tendons, ligaments -- connective tissues become sheathed in bone. It spans joints, locking them into place and rendering movement completely impossible. |
This is catastrophic beyond belief, |
What happens in FOP is children continue to make new pieces of the skeleton after birth, ... The signal is not just 'make more bone.' |
With a few notable exceptions, You'd think that we were still fighting the Soviet Union and that the Cold War were still raging on. |
You can't keep a child in a glass box, |