The Midlands Gives 2021 is an annual online giving challenge hosted by the Central Carolina Community Foundation that brings the region together as one community, raising money and awareness for local nonprofits.

Cure Sanfilippo Foundation is among the many Columbia-based organizations participating in Midlands Gives 2021. Additionally, several families with children that have Sanfilippo live or used to live in the Midland region, including Keira, Paisleigh, Eliza, Everett, and Rowen.

In 2020, generous supporters of the Foundation donated more than $5,000. The funds are used to accelerate research to find a treatment or cure for Sanfilippo Syndrome.

Sanfilippo Syndrome is a terminal, neurodegenerative disease that causes children to lose all the skills they’ve gained, suffer seizures and movement disorders, experience pain and suffering, and then die.

Currently there is no FDA-approved treatment or cure for Sanfilippo Syndrome.

Children are born with Sanfilippo Syndrome, but it is invisible until they start exhibiting developmental delays or regression in their early years.

Early symptoms of Sanfilippo Syndrome are often: speech delays, frequent ear infections, poor sleep, “Autistic” behaviors, and hyperactivity. Learn more about Sanfilippo Syndrome.