Congress has voted to
establish the first-ever national patient registry of people with Lou
Gehrig's Disease, or amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), to be
administered by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The aim is to use the collected data to help
discover the cause, and develop treatments and a cure for the deadly
neurological disease that took the life of baseball legend Lou Gehrig
in 1941.
"This bill will arm
scientists with the tools they need to make progress in the search for
a cure for ALS, or possibly a way to prevent this devastating disease
in the first place," said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.).