In joint news releases, both the Foudation Fighting Blindness (FFB) and Oxford BioMedica announced that FFB had recently awarded $125,000 to the Centre Hospitalier National d'Ophtalmologie des Quinze-Vingts, a clinical trial site for UshStat, a gene therapy developed by Oxford BioMedica for people with Usher syndrome type 1B (USH1B). The funding level is the amount needed for the site, located in Paris, France, to take part in the study. Usher syndrome is the world's leading cause of combined blindness and deafness. The condition affects approximately 45,000 people in the United States. USH1B is a form of the disease caused by defects in the gene MY07A. The UshStat treatment replaces copies of the defective MY07A gene in the retina with normal copies. Researchers believe a single treatment may halt the disease for several years, perhaps a lifetime. There are currently no therapies available for USH1B. UshStat is a novel gene-based treatment for Usher syndrome type 1B, designe...