Mr. Speaker, Beaches—East York constituents, Terry and Georgia Pirovolakis are committed to saving their toddler Michael, who suffers from an ultra-rare neurodegenerative disease known as SPG50. Among many other devastating outcomes of this disease, Michael's life will be cut incredibly short without a cure.
Our east-end community has stood beside Terry and Georgia as they have worked tirelessly to raise funds with the hope of finding a cure. Most recently, Terry trained intensely and biked from Toronto to Ottawa, where he met the Prime Minister, to help raise awareness and funds. The goal is to raise $3 million for experimental gene therapy, and they have raised an impressive $1.6 million to date. Those who want to help can go to curespg50.org.
So that those in the House, in particular, can understand the scale of community support, there were more “curespg50” lawn signs in some parts of East York than political signs in the last election. I ask the House to join me in recognizing Terry and Georgia's tireless devotion on the journey to cure Michael. I ask our federal government to support both them and our east-end community here in Toronto in that journey as well.