For cancer patients, it is a sad, but true fact, that drug companies will not back research into possible and
promising new drugs to fight cancer if the potential for profit is not part of the equation. CLL Topics Inc. of Arizona
and CLL Global Research Foundation of Texas, both non-profit organizations, are privately funding National Cancer Institute sponsored research in Mayo Clinic's
human trials of an extract found in green tea, epigallocatechin gallate, to determine if the extract has any promise in
the treatment for leukemia. The founders of both organizations suffered from chronic lymphocytic leukemia. Inexpensive drugs, over the counter drugs or drugs that cannot be patented, such as EGCG from green tea, are drugs that do not have an enormous profit potential. Abandoned by pharmaceutical companies from any research, these drugs are called orphan drugs.
