Vestavia resident honored at National Multiple Sclerosis Society conference
Charley Long of Vestavia Hills was recently honored as a Chairman’s Circle member at the National Multiple Sclerosis Society’s Leadership Conference in Fort Worth for the life-changing impact he has made as part of the Multiple Sclerosis (MS) movement.
“We are extremely grateful for this unyielding commitment to the Society’s vision for a world free of MS by our Chairman Club members,” said Cyndi Zagieboylo, president and CEO of the National MS Society.
After participating in his first Bike MS event in 2001, Long became inspired to do something about multiple sclerosis. He has since raised more than $800,000 and ridden more than 5,000 miles to help find a cure for MS, including a 42-day, 3,000 mile Ride Across America.
Each year, Long advances the awareness of multiple sclerosis by writing personal letters to everyone from his dry cleaner to his closest friends.
“My goals are two-fold,” he said. “I want to create awareness of the disease, and I want to make a significant contribution to fund research that will find a cure and support people with the disease until that cure is found.”
In order to raise additional funds for the Alabama-Mississippi Chapter of the National MS Society, Long piloted a silent auction in 2009, which has since been held annually at Alabama Power.
The auction has raised more than $70,000 since its inception to benefit those living with MS in Alabama and Mississippi.
Long serves as a member of the Board of Trustees for the Alabama-Mississippi Chapter.
Multiple sclerosis, an unpredictable, often disabling disease of the central nervous system, interrupts the flow of information within the brain, and between the brain and body. Symptoms range from numbness and tingling to blindness and paralysis. The progress, severity and specific symptoms of MS in any one person cannot yet be predicted, but advances in research and treatment are moving us closer to a world free of MS.
Most people with MS are diagnosed between the ages of 20 and 50, with at least two to three times more women than men being diagnosed with the disease. MS affects more than 2.3 million people worldwide.
The National Multiple Sclerosis Society mobilizes people and resources to drive research for a cure and to address the challenges of everyone affected by MS. In 2013 alone, through its home office and 50-state network of chapters, the society devoted $145.2 million to programs and services that assisted more than one million people.
The society also invested more than $50 million to support more than 380 new and ongoing research projects around the world.
For more, visit nationalMSsociety.org.
-Submitted by Laura Pemberton