Monday, January 8, 2024

Sickle cell

Follow-up to this post

Now let's return to "1000 Bits of Good News You May Have Missed in 2023."

Sickle cell disease is worse than I realized. It can mean the life-long threat of debilitating bouts of pain. 

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But there's new hope because of break-through innovation. 

You may have heard of CRISPR, the technology to edit the genes of living things. A clinical trial for a new CRISPR therapy was conducted four years ago with 30 eligible sickle cell patients, and, astoundingly, it worked for 29 of them. Better than "anyone dared hope." 

A year after the therapy, one of the patients said it changed her life: “Now I’ll be there to help my daughters pick out their wedding dresses. And we’ll be able to take family vacations. And they’ll have their mom every step of the way.”

from Atlantic

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