Regulators in the United States have approved the first
gene therapy treatment for leukemia, which comes with a
price tag of $475,000 (N144.87 million).
The Guardian UK reports that the treatment, which was
made by Novartis and is marketed as Kymriah, will use
the patient’s cells to fight the disease.
Kymriah is a one-time intravenous treatment
administered to patients.
“This a brand new way of treating cancer,” said Stephan
Grupp, a doctor at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.
Grupp is credited with treating a patient using the new
immunotherapy procedure; a girl who has been cancer-
free for five years since the treatment.
“Five years ago, we began collaborating with the
University of Pennsylvania and invested in further
developing and bringing what we believed would be a
paradigm-changing immunocellular therapy to cancer
patients in dire need,” Joseph Jimenez, Novartis CEO
said, in a statement.
“With the approval of Kymriah, we are once again
delivering on our commitment to change the course of
cancer care.”
US regulators approved the treatment after a clinical trial
where a single dose of Kymriah left 83% of the 63
participants cancer-free after three months.
To get the treatment, patients would have to travel to
one of the 32 centres available in the US where doctors
will harvest their white blood cells and ship them to a
Norvatis facility in New Jersey where it is edited and sent
back.
According to the company, the whole process takes
about 22 days.
TheCable
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