The project ‘Abrazos’ (Hugs) started in 2015 and it aims to provide donations for children in Colombia and Venezuela living in families affected by HD and in extreme poverty conditions. Their family situation is dire and many of the kids have been abandoned by one of their parents. Often times,…

The image above has become symbolic for me. During my second visit to San Angel, a rural area in the State of Magdalena in Colombia, I visited a few families dispersed in the countryside, isolated from the rest of the world, a countryside that hides many patients away from aid,…

A life gone too soon Last week we lost a friend and a very special person. A life story that would have remained untold. He is one of the forgotten children of the world, a life made difficult by poverty, by Huntington’s disease, and by social neglect. His story, now…

Factor-H organized a series of events beginning on July 4 in Barranquilla, Colombia, with the first gathering of at-risk HD youth from 5 Latin American countries, co-organized with HDYO. The meeting was a first step in identifying and training a group of young people from South America, to extend outreach…

Today’s “life stories” brings us to a very difficult and sad place, but one that unfortunately exists. Many people with Huntington’s end up abandoned on the street. Whether left by their families or due to psychiatric issues that arise from the disease itself, young HD affected persons sometimes end up…

Dilia Oviedo Oviedo is 79 years old.  She had 12 children. One was stillborn. Of the 11 children that survived to adulthood, 4 already died from Huntington’s disease. 4 more are currently sick with HD, 2 in late manifest disease. Her husband died in the early 90s, and now a…

I met Roberto and his family when I visited them in April in Juan de Acosta, in the Atlántico State of the Colombian Caribbean coast. Juan de Acosta was considered the second largest HD cluster in the world, although many affected families have left the town in the recent years.…

As the country of Venezuela spins out of control and people run out of food and medication, the most significant communities affected by Huntington’s disease in Maracaibo are starving. According to our friend and collaborator Dr. Ernesto Solis, a resident of Maracaibo and a tireless advocate of the families affected…

Our work keeps progressing, albeit slowly, to assist impoverished families in Colombia and Venezuela. With the help of several small donations from pharmaceutical and biotech companies working in the field of HD, we were able to gather some resources to finalize our aid programs in 2016. Thank you to those…

Janeth Mosquera and her team at AcolpEH work tirelessly for the benefit of the families living wiht HD in Bogota, Medellin and Choco, among other regions of Colombia.Factor-H has been working with AcolpEH for over 3 years now. One of the programs we started a couple of years ago was…