A promise and hope for patients. The Montpellier University Hospital Institute (IHU) is launching an appeal to fund medical research into stiff person syndrome (SPR), from which Celine Dion suffers. This autoimmune disease with no known cure to date causes acute pain, difficulty moving and spasms.
“I think that for her, 10 million euros is not much. And it’s not at all a joke, if someone comes with 10 million euros to develop a biomedicine, in two years they will be ready,” says the director of IHU Immu4cure Christian Jorgensen, in France Blue.
The rheumatologist, specializing in autoimmune diseases and innovative immunotherapies, was contacted by the singer’s entourage in 2023, without following up. This time, Christian Jorgensen hopes that his appeal will be heard by the 56-year-old star.
Video“Even if I have to crawl”: affected by illness, Céline Dion wants to return to the stage
IHU teams are currently focusing their research on several immune diseases such as polyarthritis and lupus, which affect thousands of people in France. “We can target and destroy the immune cells that produce antibodies that turn against the body itself. Today, we do it to treat polyarthritis and lupus, we know how to do it,” insists Christian Jorgensen.
Stiff person syndrome requires little medical research, which is expensive, because it concerns “at most fifty patients in France,” regrets the scientist. The singer’s announcement helped to shine the spotlight on this little-known disease.
The laboratory would mobilize several engineers for clinical trials carried out at Montpellier University Hospital, with no guarantee of success.
“It’s a fight forever”
Céline Dion was forced to put her career on hold and cancel her European tour in 2022. She reveals her health problems in the documentary “Je suis Céline” available on Prime Video since June 18. We see the star in the grip of a violent crisis, her body stiff and her gaze fixed.
“When life imposes a challenge on you, you have two choices: take it head on, or not,” explained Céline Dion during the premiere in New York, who assures that her decision to discuss her situation in the documentary is both “a great gift and a great responsibility”.
She, who has been rare in public since the announcement of her illness, also hopes that the film will encourage people suffering from the same syndrome. In an interview with TF1, the Quebec singer confided that she wanted to get back on stage even if she had to “talk with her hands”. His name is being circulated to sing at the opening ceremony of the Paris 2024 Olympics on Saturday July 26.
“It’s difficult to be here but at the same time I’m very moved,” the star also declared on the red carpet, this time in French. “I feel like I still have a lot of support and a lot of love and I hope this documentary will help, because it helped me a lot, even if it’s a fight forever, one day at home. times. »
