RE: ADSactly Tech News - The Ethics of Gene Editing

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ADSactly Tech News - The Ethics of Gene Editing

in technology •  7 years ago 

Thank you for a thought provoking post. The degree of ethical questions in genetic therapies vary greatly depending on the specific treatment. Here is a list of some of the current and potential genetic treatments.
#Gene regulation
Treatments which increase or decrease the output of a specific gene.
Down regulation of Tau protein production to treat alzheimer's disease (research phase). Here is an example https://www.sangamo.com/product-pipeline/central-nervous-system
#Cell therapy
Cancer treatments using CAR-T cells. Currently in clinical trials using CRISPRs. see https://ghr.nlm.nih.gov/primer/genomicresearch/genomeediting for information on CRISPR technology

#Gene therapy
Use a viral vector to introduce a gene into cells in the body. This does not alter the existing genome. There are currently multiple trials to treat hemophilia A using this approach.

#Gene editing
Now we are talking about editing the actual genome. This has recently started on somatic cells. These changes are not passed onto children.
One example is using a viral vector to deliver tools to edit the genome to liver cells. Replace the albumin gene in a small percentage of liver cells and start producing the new protein. As the liver grows/regenerates this change will be maintained. This AP article has an excellent summary
https://apnews.com/4ae98919b52e43d8a8960e0e260feb0a/AP-Exclusive:-US-scientists-try-1st-gene-editing-in-the-body?utm_campaign=SocialFlow&utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=AP
#Editing germ cells that will pass genetic changes onto offspring is extremely controversial. Given our current level of technology it is considered unethical by most investigators.

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