Cuban biotechnological industry develops projects to tackle Ataxia

 HAVANA, Cuba, Oct 1 (ACN) In order to improve the quality of life of patients with the Ataxia disease, the biotechnological and pharmaceutical industry is developing innovation projects to face this global health problem.

According to the website of the Biotechnological and Pharmaceutical Industries Group, the Cuban Neurosciences Center is developing a research project associated to the National Neurosciences and Neurotechnologies Program, whose purpose is to search for novel biomarkers for the early characterization of this disease.

These biomarkers are designed based on high-field magnetic resonance imaging, gait and posture studies using state-of-the-art quantitative techniques and clinical, psychological, biochemical and immunological tools.

The Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology in the 1990s created a transgenic mouse model in which a gene from a deceased ataxic was inserted and the animal developed the disease, which became an important tool for preclinical pharmacology research before reaching humans.

Similarly, the Center for Drug Research and Development registered zinc sulfate for the treatment of these patients, taking into account that clinical trials demonstrated immunological and cognitive improvement.

Also, the Center for Molecular Immunology is developing a clinical trial with NeuralCIM, a neuroprotector that in the early stages of study evidenced advances in the clinical and cognitive elements of ataxics.

Ataxia is a motor disorder characterized by a lack of coordination in the performance of voluntary movements that alters their speed and precision, affecting walking, limbs and speech.

According to data from the Ministry of Public Health, Cuba is the country in the world with the highest prevalence of ataxia, hereditary type, at a rate of 36.2 cases per 100 thousand inhabitants, although its frequency in the eastern province of Holguin is 183 cases per 100 thousand people.

In the country, 75 new cases of the mutation are diagnosed and 25 patients die each year, and it reports 2,400 people with the disease and 10,000 asymptomatic family members, belonging to 200 families.