The National Institutes of Health (NIH) today announced the launch of a new initiative to help speed the development of a cure for sickle cell disease, a group of inherited blood disorders affecting at least 100,000 people in the United States and 20 million worldwide. The Cure Sickle Cell Initiative will take advantage of the latest genetic discoveries and technological advances to move the most promising genetic-based curative therapies safely into clinical trials within five to 10 years.
“Our scientific investments have brought us to a point where we have many tools available to correct or compensate for the defective gene that causes sickle cell disease. We are now ready to use these tools to speed up our quest for a cure,” said Gary H. Gibbons, M.D., director of NIH’s National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI), which is leading the effort.
Sickle cell disease results from a single genetic mutation that causes a person’s red blood cells to form an abnormal, sickle shape. These sickled cells can clog the blood vessels and deprive cells of oxygen. In turn, this lack of oxygen wreaks havoc on the body, damaging organs, causing severe pain, and potentially leading to premature death.
Decades of basic research on sickle cell disease have laid the groundwork for novel genetic approaches to cures, such as the genetic editing of bone marrow cells, which have shown great promise in animal models and in some small-scale human studies.
In addition, the NHLBI Production Assistance for