An insurance entrepreneur has set out to raise £400,000 for the development of a gene therapy treatment for a form of Leber’s Congenital Amaurosis, known as LCA4, a type of congenital blindness.
A statement from Moorfields Eye Hospital said Michael Wade wanted raise funds while fulfilling a lifetime's ambition to conduct an orchestra, for friends and family, taking place this evening.
He will contribute to a treatment to be developed at the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Biomedical Research Centre at Moorfields Eye Hospital and the UCL Institute of Ophthalmology.
It will be led by Professor James Bainbridge, a consultant surgeon at Moorfields Eye Hospital and professor of retinal studies at University College London, who is working alongside Professor Robin Ali on a research programme to develop gene therapy for inherited eye disease.
Wade, currently the Crown Representative at the Cabinet-Office for insurance, has had detached retinas in both his eyes in the past few years and received treatment at Moorfields Eye Hospital.
He will take to the podium at St John’s Smith Square in London on May 22 to conduct Saint-Saëns’ Symphony No 3: “Organ Symphony” at a private concert for 200 friends to mark his 60th birthday.