The Oklahoma AIDS Care Fund has given $50,000 to the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation. The grant will endow a lecture series that will bring a world leader in Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome research to speak at OMRF each year.Founded in 1991, the Oklahoma AIDS Care Fund provides financial support for groups offering research, services and education to fight AIDS and HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. Over the years, the fund has given $3.4 million to nonprofit organizations, all in Oklahoma.
The lion’s share of those funds are raised through the fund’s annual Red Tie Night gala and auction, which has become the largest one-time fundraising event in the state. This year, it netted almost $600,000.
Our cause is to fight AIDS in the state of Oklahoma,” said Barbara Cooper, president and founder of the fund. “Education and research are the keys to this fight, so we are delighted to add this lecture series at OMRF to our efforts.”
The first speaker in the annual series will be David Ho, M.D., Scientific Director of the Aaron Diamond AIDS Research Center at the Rockefeller University in New York City. Ho was selected Time magazine’s “Person of the Year” in 1996 for his groundbreaking research on HIV and will speak at OMRF on February 15-16, 2005.
“This donation from the AIDS Care Fund will not only help OMRF scientists in their quest to better understand HIV, but it will also give all interested Oklahomans the unique opportunity to hear some of the world’s foremost AIDS researchers,” said J. Donald Capra, M.D., president of OMRF. “This is a very special gift, indeed, and we hope it will pay dividends for every Oklahoman who is interested in stopping this deadly disease.”
Through the years, OMRF researchers have made important advances in the field of HIV research. Most notably, Jordan Tang, Ph.D., helped lay the scientific groundwork for inhibitors that stopped the AIDS virus from replicating. These inhibitors proved to be a crucial ingredient in HIV cocktails, the potent AIDS-fighting therapeutics that have added years to the lives of those suffering from the disease. Current HIV research at OMRF focuses on developing vaccines to protect women from contracting the disease.
About OMRF:
Chartered in 1946, OMRF (www.omrf.org) is a nonprofit biomedical research institute dedicated to understanding and curing human disease. Its scientist focus on such critical research areas as Alzheimer’s disease, cancer, AIDS and cardiovascular disease. OMRF is home to Oklahoma’s only member of the national Academy of Sciences.
