Africa! Run for the hills from anything this “unusual collaboration” is peddling.

#Health
Africa! Run for the hills from anything this “unusual collaboration” is peddling.

Loveworld / 2 hours

April 9, 2024

1 min read

Two major U.S. biomedical research funders plan to each put at least $100 million over 4 years toward bringing cutting-edge, gene-based treatments to a part of the world that often struggles to provide access to even basic medicines: sub-Saharan Africa.
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation  announced the unusual collaboration to launch clinical trials for gene-based cures for HIV and sickle cell disease within the region in the coming decade.
The ambitious goal is to steer clear of expensive, logistically impractical strategies that require stem cell transplantation, and instead develop simpler, affordable ways of delivering genes or gene-editing drugs that can cure these diseases.