convention

Patient advocacy groups have many different roles.  They are educators, they provide a support system for individuals and families of people living with illness, they lobby for increased research, and are increasingly providing funding to biotech companies to encourage further research and development of promising, and potentially life-saving therapies.  At the 2009 BIO International Convention, we met with patients  and patient advocates to learn more about how advocacy groups are working together with biotech researchers to promote innovative research and creation of therapies that may one d

In August, 2009, I attended the 7th International Transgenic Animal Research Conference in Tahoe, California. I visited with Dr. James Murray, Professor, University of California in Davis. Dr. Murray is the organizer of the Conference. His research is producing genetically engineered (GE) goats. He and scientists in Brazil are teaming up to develop a herd of GE dairy goats, whose milk is expected to protect against the types of diarrheal diseases that each year claim the lives of more than 2 million children around the world.

BIO's Daryl Pritchard talks about oncology and personalized medicine at the BIO Internation Convention.

The Group Room, a cancer talk radio show.

Listen to the show:

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• Philippe Bishop, MD
  Vice President, Clinical Development, Oncology, Genentech BioOncology
• Daryl E.
  

Well, as the BIO 2008 International Convention draws to a close we can say that this has been one of the best shows ever. We ended up with 20,108 industry leaders from 70 different countries and 48 states.

The full Convention program included four full days with 175 breakout sessions, 21 educational tracks, more than 1,000 speakers, three keynote sessions, six Super Sessions and three CEO Forum sessions.

"We use the language of life to fix its mistakes. We use the language of life to enable us to live on this planet sustainably.  Decoding the secrets of life scares some people, but it inspires us.  Some people ask how can you play God with the language of life?  We say we're not trying to be God...we are only trying to be fully human.  Though we cannot see all that the future holds, our vision is clear.

As many of you know Gov. Patrick is to be honored as BIO's Governor of the year in a few days.  Well today, he showed us why by signing the Massachusetts Life Sciences Law.

The 10-year $1 billion investment package is the result of a year-long collaboration between the Governor, the Legislature, academia, life sciences industry leaders and patient advocacy groups.

It was last year in Boston at BIO that Governor Patrick first took the stage with Senate President Murray and Speaker DiMasi to announce the $1 billion Life Sciences Initiative.

Congratuations Gov. Patrick and Massachusetts!

We are excited to announce that we have launched our spiffy new BIO 2008 convention newsroom.