Introducing Our First Patient-Focused Research Symposium | November 2025

Transcript:

Steve Winfield: Hello. I’m Steve Winfield, the Chairman of the Board of CLL Global Research Foundation. I’d like to welcome you to our first-ever patient-focused research symposium.

Just a little bit about CLL Global, as you may know, we have literally played a critical role in the launch of every single FDA-approved CLL treatment on the market that’s ever been brought to market. But there’s still a lot of work for us to do.

There are patients who don’t tolerate some of these medications well; there are some patients who relapse, some patients have Richter’s transformations, and many patients have secondary cancers that we know are the result of CLL.  So, still a lot of work for us to do. And so, in terms of how we operate, sometimes our researchers that you’ll be hearing from today, actually invent the drug. And sometimes the drug is invented by pharma. But in any case, no matter where it comes from, we have to determine, and we fund, as CLL Global, what is the proper dose – well, first of all, does it work at all? What is the proper dose? What’s the patient population that the drug is most meaningful for? Should it be taken with other drugs, in conjunction with it? And if so, how does that change the dosage and duration of treatment? And we also follow patients for many years to make sure that the results that we expect to get are, in fact, achieved and that there isn’t a relapse situation.

So, all of this is done with the goal of curing CLL, and also to provide patients with an improved health span. Not just a life span, but a health span. So, with this in mind, right now, we need your help more than we ever have to bridge the gap between what we know we must do and what we can realistically afford to do. In the past, our funding has been basically a sweetener to some of these researchers for funded research, research that was also funded by the U.S. Government and others, and currently, those, the government and other sources have dried up, and we, as CLL Global, are providing all the funding for some of this research.

And, in fact, the demands for our funding and for funding these researchers has never been larger than it is now. And it’s growing exponentially. And unfortunately, some of the young researchers that we have focused on in the past, not just in the U.S., but throughout the world, are actually, but especially in the U.S., are actually finding themselves shying away from medicine because of these obstacles and funding cuts and so forth, or trying to move elsewhere to do it. So, the population of up-and-coming young brilliant minds that we’ve been cultivating for years now is really being challenged by the current situation.

So, again, we really need your help. We have to fund this research, and we have to fund these researchers. So, I would like everyone to keep in mind that more than 95 percent of every dollar that’s donated to CLL Global goes directly to research. So, our mission is purely to cure CLL and improve the health span of our patients, but at the same time, we’re finding that some of our research can have or may have benefit to other forms of cancer, such as breast cancer and even pancreatic cancer. So, we feel like we’re doing the right thing.

The funding decisions that we make are well considered by people that have been in this industry both forever and some of the early inventors of some of these treatments, as well as some of these brilliant young minds you’re going to hear from. So, the funding choices are very thoughtful, but the situation is really significant in terms of needing your help at this point.

So, the doctors you’re going to hear from are the ones that are dreaming up the possibilities that we’re funding. And they’re actually making them a reality and achieving them through the funding we’re providing. So, if you’ve donated to CLL Global in the past, you should feel proud of what you’ve done. And please, when you hear these people that you contributed to the success that you’re gonna hear about, and if you haven’t or even if you have, please, please donate to CLL Global, now. We need the support now. We need to carry on, and we need to carry on in a strong way with funding many more researchers than we’ve had to in the past. So, this is all about helping us help you. Basically, it’s about our collective health.

So, enjoy this symposium, and every dollar helps us. Sorry to be so direct on the funding message. But again, the demands on CLL Global have accelerated tremendously, and we really need to bridge the gap from what the government’s doing versus what needs to be done in our field. So, thank you very much for your time.