Questioning Gene Editing

When it comes to the new gene-editing therapy known as CRISPR, the scientific community appears to be divided. While its applications for disease prevention are encouraging, the ethical implications and the unknown repercussions related to individual health remain a serious concern.

But where do the patients stand when it comes to the use of gene-editing therapy?

According to representatives from various patient advocacy organizations, the jury is still out on whether this technology is really a positive thing. People are still concerned about getting more information in order to make the proper choices.

“We’re a long way from a final opinion on any of these issues,” says Richard Hynes, a cancer researcher and co-chair of the national committee from Massachusetts Institute of Technology. “[It’s a] a discussion, not a finalization of opinions.”

To move the discussion forward, the medical community needs to learn more about the technology and base decisions on facts, not fear of the unknown.

Extraordinary Results With New T-cell Therapy

Scientists have been using the immune T-cells to target cancers, producing extraordinary results. Patients who would typically only have a few months to live are now in remission.

The scientists have shown that this process, which involves the engineering of immune cells to target a specific type of blood cancer, has been very successful in their early clinical trials.

Widespread implementation of this practice will take some time, as is the case with all medical advancements. Not to mention the use of T-cell therapy is very dangerous and typically only used as a last resort. But for those patients who have exhausted all other options, the early results of this process is extremely promising.

The T-cell therapy is administered by removing immune cells from patients and then tagging them with receptor molecules that target a specific cancer. The cells are then infused back in the body.

Speaking at the annual meeting for the American Association for the Advancement for Science (AAAS), researcher Stanley Riddell said: “This is unprecedented in medicine, to be honest, to get response rates in this range in these very advanced patients.” In one of the studies, 94% of participants with acute lymphoblastic leukemia saw symptoms vanish completely.

So far, these tests have only targeted certain blood cancers. More will need to be done to determine how long patients remain in remission; cancer cells can sometimes hid unnoticed by the body’s defenses, or instead, overwhelm the defense systems and throw the immune system into overdrive.

“Much like chemotherapy and radiotherapy, it’s not going to be a save-all,” Riddell said of the new therapy, adding: “I think immunotherapy has finally made it to a pillar of cancer therapy.”

To learn more about this study, please check out this Guardian article.