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Excision's CRISPR HIV therapy is heading into human testing after FDA clearance
- Kliment 5y agoThere's several more in their pipeline: https://www.excision.bio/technology https://www.excision.bio/technology
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- biggio 5y agoUhm the HSV vaccine pipeline seems to have changed. Excision had clinical trials scheduled for 2021 a few years back, if I'm not mistaken. There are about 4 billion people infected with HSV worldwide*. Excision could prioritize and deliver the HSV vaccine and have the company well-funded for other causes. * https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/herpes-simplex-virus https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/herpes-simp...
- ruined 5y agohsv may have a broader market, but there is clearly a greater social benefit and urgency to new hiv treatments. hsv infection is essentially a minor annoyance compared to hiv which can be life-changing and lethal.
- wyager 5y agoHSV is, iirc, one of the most significant causes of serious conditions like viral encephalitis. I wouldn’t be surprised if the net impact were similar to or greater than an HIV cure, considering that about 5,000x more people have HSV than HIV (order of magnitude estimate from a quick look at some stats I found online). Of course, the PR of an HIV cure is much better.
- ruined 5y agohsv encephalitis incidence is like 2 per million which is absolutely incomparable to hiv infection which has rates as much as 1 in 5 in some high risk populations and 4930 per million globally. the net impact of a new effective hiv treatment is indisputably more significant.
- wyager 5y ago> hsv encephalitis incidence is like 2 per million This can’t possibly be correct. It’s the most commonly diagnosed etiology for viral encephalitis, which definitely occurs more than a single digit per million. It’s also going to be underdiagnosed because the diagnostics are bad (fewer than half of encephalitis cases are assigned an etiology). I see several sources saying in the range of 2-4,000 confirmed HSV encephalitis cases per year in the US (which are usually extremely severe, leading to brain damage or death), compared to 5,500 “HIV-related” deaths per year in the US according to the CDC. So at the very least they seem similar in magnitude.
- biggio 5y agoAccording to Crunchbase*, Excision received $70M in investment. A meagre amount of funding for the causes Excision is working on. * https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/excision-biotherapeutics/company_financials https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/excision-biotherapeu...
- anakaine 5y agoHIV is very manageable with drugs, and life expectations are very high. Whilst the disease is horrible, and we should be seeking a cure, its manageable. HSV is emerging as one of the biggest contributors to dementia. That is itself a disease that kills - just over a longer time span. Unfortunately for HSV there is little long term strategy for management that can address this issue. The *ciclovir drugs primarily target viral shedding, and not the rest of the infection cycle.
- KingMachiavelli 5y agoI'd be very surprised if the long term cognitive effects of HSV were greater than HIV even with modern drugs.
- est31 5y agoIt takes non trivial logistical efforts to deliver HIV drugs to people. Think folks living in slums in south africa, homeless drug users in the USA, etc. Around 680k people died of AIDS related illnesses in 2020 alone. https://www.unaids.org/en/resources/fact-sheet https://www.unaids.org/en/resources/fact-sheet Also the number of HIV infected people is still increasing. https://www.avert.org/global-hiv-and-aids-statistics https://www.avert.org/global-hiv-and-aids-statistics
- yakshaving_jgt 5y agoFWIW, it seems as though Dr Jerome at FHC is further along with HSV anyway.
- toomuchtodo 5y agoRelevant Reddit threads: https://old.reddit.com/r/HerpesCureResearch/comments/kvr1ka/recap_of_dr_jeromes_hsv_update_video_link/ https://old.reddit.com/r/HerpesCureResearch/comments/kvr1ka/... https://old.reddit.com/r/HerpesCureResearch/comments/ppgg15/update_from_fhc/ https://old.reddit.com/r/HerpesCureResearch/comments/ppgg15/...
- lucb1e 5y ago> seems to have changed. Excision had clinical trials scheduled for 2021 a few years back, if I'm not mistaken Perhaps this could help: https://web.archive.org/web/*/https://www.excision.bio/technology https://web.archive.org/web/*/https://www.excision.bio/techn...
- TaylorAlexander 5y agoI recently found a great subreddit with a table in their stickied thread about the latest research on HSV cures and treatments. There are several cures under testing and we may see the first people cured of HSV in 2024: https://www.reddit.com/r/HerpesCureResearch/comments/kg66ds/latest_research_updates_especially_for_new_joiners/ https://www.reddit.com/r/HerpesCureResearch/comments/kg66ds/...
- Kliment 5y agoClinical trials are expensive so unless you're massively well funded (like Moderna and BioNTech are at the moment, and basically nobody else in that space) you have to prioritize for whichever is the most promising based on prelim data. This is a problem trivially solved with money, but for some reason all the promising biotech developers are massively underfunded compared to branches such as killing people or selling advertising.
- esturk 5y agoIs this the front leader in using CRISPR at the moment? The Radiolab podcast a few years back was saying that many labs started researching things so I imagine there's going to be a lot more biotech companies popping up soon. Just like the renaissance that came after the dark ages.
- hughes 5y agoBetween this and Moderna's mRNA HIV vaccine, it's possible we'll see HIV eradicated in the coming years. Really amazing.
- jimbob45 5y agoNo one’s pushing. If PrEP had come out in the 80s, you can be certain that HIV would have been eradicated by now by force of public will.
- geophile 5y agoHave you met COVID?
- jimbob45 5y agoPrEP prevents transmission 99% of the time. COVID has the same rate…but only for preventing serious infection.
- roflc0ptic 5y agoYea but like, is everyone going to take PrEP all of the time? It’s great I’m sure if you’re planning on doing otherwise risky behavior, but in my experience, risky sex is never especially premeditated. It’s just a “just this once”, and then suddenly you’re buying plan B.
- toomuchtodo 5y agoCompliance can definitely be a challenge with pharma in pill form, but even with a modest amount of effort, it would radically reduce transmission throughout a population as those who are able to adhere to the dosage schedule would act as a firebreak in the greater population. Like those who are vaccinated against high transmission communicable diseases. The UK is on track to eliminate HIV transmission within the decade [1] [2] assuming PrEP use within and near high risk populations. So, to answer your question ("is everyone going to take PrEP all of the time?"), that seems like a reasonable solution until a vaccine is approved for prevention and a CRISPR protocol is developed for therapy in the already infected. It may even take some time for HIV production to ramp, making prEP even more important so the at risk don't get complacent and an unnecessary bump in infections occurs. (it's important to note that kidney function should be monitored in those on PrEP) [1] https://www.aidsmap.com/news/nov-2017/uk-moving-towards-elimination-hiv-transmission https://www.aidsmap.com/news/nov-2017/uk-moving-towards-elim... [2] https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/how-likely-is-england-to-achieve-zero-new-hiv-cases-by-2030 https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/how-likely-is-engl...
- datameta 5y agoThis body of research is expanding far quicker than I would have imagined pre-pandemic. A true silver lining, I have to say. mRNA vaccine breakthroughs are occurring in cancer research, too. Human trials happening soon! https://www.futuretimeline.net/blog/2021/09/13-mrna-future-cancer.htm https://www.futuretimeline.net/blog/2021/09/13-mrna-future-c...
- bamboozled 5y agoI have to say that we’re all being pretty highly optimistic since the first production grade mRNA vaccine looks like it doesn’t really give resistance for a long time to Covid. It’s cool tech but it’s not magic.
- uncoder0 5y agoYeah, true the mRNA SARS-COV vaccines aren't all that effective after many months however, it could work better for things that don't mutate as much as Coronaviruses. It could still be magic. We just don't know yet it's all relatively new tech medically speaking and this is the current vaccines using the tech are the first ever widespread usage of the tech. We'll see how it goes long-term No one really knows how well or not it's going to go.
- catdog 5y agoYes it's way too early to draw conclusions. Think currently mRNA vaccines still stand strong compared to what else is on the market. Also one of the big promises of the mRNA technology is increased development speed so it might especially be helpful for things which mutate fast.
- laurent92 5y agoCan it pose a risk of making other mutations? and adding too much variation that ecosystems are not ready to defend against? All the arguments of the GMO, repeated (although it seems the GMO argument is settled).
- mrtweetyhack 5y agowhile other people who don't acquire avoidable diseases are left to die. thanks for nothing
- DantesKite 5y agoI wonder how much of this recent development can be attributed to the Covid pandemic—whether it's helped clear up a lot of red tape or whether the development has been largely unaffected negatively or positively.
- refurb 5y agoCRISPR had been around long before Covid. A lot can happen in 5 years.
- esturk 5y agoAnd a lot has happened in the past 5 years already. From theory to human trials (curing sickle cell, liver diseases) to FDA approved treatment for blindness (Luxturna) and spinal muscular distrophy (Zolgensma). And its not just labs in America doing it. This is in labs and startups all over the world. It's like a gold rush right now.
- techsin101 5y agosources for live diseases?
- esturk 5y agohttps://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/06/26/1009817539/he-inherited-a-devastating-disease-a-crispr-gene-editing-breakthrough-stopped-it https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/06/26/1009817...
- c7DJTLrn 5y agoI am somewhat scared of this mRNA/fancy biotech stuff. We are really playing with fire and I dread to think what happens if we screw up. I don't think the way we test this stuff is sufficient. We need some kind of simulated unit testing for drugs.
- landryraccoon 5y agoWhat do you fear will happen exactly?
- c7DJTLrn 5y agoLike another comment said, cancer, but that's probably one of the better ones on the list of possibilities. Neurogeneration, mutation of gametes, accidental sterilisation. Let me be very clear - I'm NOT promoting an anti-science viewpoint here or saying that progress is a bad thing. I'm simply stating that we're in possession of powerful new tools and if we aren't careful, we're going to end up with more Thalidomide babies or worse. Applying this new technology on people and then measuring the outcome is not an appropriate or ethical strategy. It's not appropriate because the consequences could be very hard to detect or not present themselves for decades. And it's not ethical because it's harder to predict what could go wrong.
- agumonkey 5y agoWhat mechanisms can lead to long term mutations?
- albertgoeswoof 5y agoThis is an “anti-science” viewpoint though- you’re providing a bunch of hypotheses but no evidence for them. And then you’re throwing in unrelated historical situations “Thalidomide babies” to evoke the “think of the children” argument, provoking moral outrage. Finally you throw up a straw man to imply that science doesn’t generally use ethical practices, of which you provide no evidence for.
- deleted 5y ago
- techsin101 5y agoIsn't CRISPR known to cause random unintended edits along intended edits?
- yeswecatan 5y agoYes, also called off target edits. Seems like there have been some efforts (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7407193/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7407193/) to minimize them, though I'm sure they are very hard to avoid.
- techsin101 5y agoDoesn’t that render every application of this tech net negative. I’ll cure you BUT give you many other incurable diseases. Imagine git had “git ai fix“. It fixes bug but also randomly changes code in entire code base and God knows how many runtime bugs now exist.
- philprx 5y agoWhat a name for a company: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Excision https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Excision Excision may refer to: * ... * Type II female genital mutilation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Female_genital_mutilation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Female_genital_mutilation
- rnhmjoj 5y agoIt just means "cutting out" in a medical context. I'd say the fact that you can cut out genitalia is very tangential. In molecular biology it refers to removing a sequence of genetic material, so it's quite appropriate for this therapy.
- BizarroLand 5y agoThis is digging deep to find a reason for outrage and it didn't work. There's no connection between their work and FGM.
- okay475008 5y agowait until you're all told cancer was cured years ago and they just now felt like "testing it" on sick patients decades later.
- mateo1 5y agoTime to back up my DNA.
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