Boy whose parents made Lorenzo's oil dies at 30

[FourScore]

The man whose parents' battle to save him from a nerve disease was told in the movie "Lorenzo's Oil" has died at his home in Virginia.

The father of Lorenzo Odone says his son died Friday at age 30. Doctors had predicted he would die when he was 8.

Augusto Odone says his son had come down recently with pneumonia.

Susan Sarandon and Nick Nolte starred as Michaela and Augusto Odone in the 1992 movie. They formulated an oil that they said helped their son fight the neurological disease.

A study published in 2005 verified that the oil could prevent the onset of symptoms.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080530/ap_en_mo/obit_lorenzo_odone

[CaliforniaPeggy]

1. That was one hell of a movie...

Beautifully told...

Those people were fighters!

Safe passage to that young man...

The "orphan" diseases...it's so hard to get the funding to study them...

[TZ]

10. absolutely

As someone who also has an "orphan" disease, I can attest to that.

[Crabby Appleton]

2. RIP Lorenzo

I use to work at the company that produced Lorenzo's Oil (the oil, not the movie), then called Karlshamns, now merged with another Swedish company, and now called AarhusKarlshamn AB.

http://www.aak.com/

[Olney Blue]

3. RIP, Lorenzo. My condolences to the family.

[lightningandsnow]

4. That is so sad.

Rest in peace, Lorenzo.

[roguevalley]

5. few people can say their life meant so much to others, this boy and

his parents. Vios condios. (God, I wish I could spell.)

[Th1onein]

6. In this day and age, ALL parents of sick children should do

what the Odones did. To depend on the pharmaceutical companies is madness.

[hedgehog]

9. Sometimes a movie doesn't tell the whole story.

Pharmaceutical companies are profit making institutions, but don't knock the scientific method. In the early days of AIDs, some medicines were rushed to patients without passing standard protocols because there was no treatment and people were desperate. There are still questions about whether more harm was done than good.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/27/AR2007012701542.html

[TZ]

11. Well

There are a lot of desperate parents that have hurt(or even killed) their children by doing just what you recommend, there are a lot of snake oil merchants preying on desperate people.
The pharmas actually have to have proof of their meds working, quacks can just claim they know better.

[BuddhaGirl]

13. thank god his parents didn't listen

and tenaciously pursued their search for a treatment.

From the article in post #9, quoting the researcher who worked with the Odones:

"If I had a son with ALD and someone said, 'Put your boy in a controlled trial,' " Moser said, "I would say, 'Go to hell.' "

RIP, Lorenzo.

[roguevalley]

14. I agree. Never take worst case scenarios. My dad wouldn't have

had the 21 years he had if we had done that. and than you for the spelling, my friends. that is why I love this place. :)

[NorthernSpy]

8. (Vaya con Dios)

-----------,<@

[Ilsa]

12. Here you go, for future reference:

"vaya con Dios"

[jasmine621]

7. Very sad. I glad they had 30 years with him. nt