Gene Therapy Cures "Bubble Boy"

bofh31337 writes "NewScientist is reporting that Welsh boy Rhys Evans has been cured of the fatal severe combined immunodeficiency ("bubble boy") disease. The medical team, lead by Adrian Thrasher, was able to take the stem cells that give rise to immune cells from his bone marrow and add a normal copy of the gene to the stem cell using a retro virus. Seven months after treatment, Rhys was cured."

Comments

Playing God?

[Bowfinger]

Part of me is terrified at the potential for creating unimaginable horrors; the other part is completely in awe of the amazing things science can do. We're moving closer and closer to playing God. I pray we're up to the responsibility.

Truly awesome.

Re:Playing God?

[flynt]

Why is it that no matter what things humans do to the earth (good or bad), the ONLY time we're "playing God" is when we fiddle with genes. Very arbitrary criterion if you ask me. Did not God create the trees and the animals? Why when we destroy or create these things then are we not "playing God". It seems a bit illogical to me.

Re:Playing God?

[bani]

When vaccination was discovered, the religious community spoke out against vaccination on the same grounds -- that dying of smallpox was "god's will" and that vaccination was "playing god".

The claim is as stupid today as it was then.

Re:Playing God?

[Chanc_Gorkon]

God gives us everything. At least that's what I belive. If god does not want us to know something, he won't let us. That's my opinion. So long as any gene research does not result in a death or crippling some one or for the sake of better boobs, I think it's ok in my opinion. I personally would have loved some of this stuff to be found out years ago because now I may have a grandma to talk to and her talk back instead of visiting someone who can just listen to me. I am not sure what she had, but what I do know is it messed her brain up and she's almost not like grandma. All of her mental functions are ok, it's just that she doesn't have much control of her muscles. It started as a flayling of hands....for a time they thought it might have been Parkinsons, but it wasn't. Now you have to be careful how close you get to her sometimes cuz she could accidently slap ya. Not funny and she doesn't mean to do it, but if they had figured out how to fix this in time, she'd be mostly normal (even if she's old). I want to WALK with my grandma and have fun with her like I did when I was a kid/teenager. My son will only know his great grandma as some old lady in a bed. If any religious zealot wants to keep this from people who truely need it, then to heck with em! How many years more of Michael J Fox's acting would we have if they could reverse his parkinsons? I think it's right as long as we are fixing something. Doing genetic alterations in the womb is something that should not be done and also gene alterations just for better looking kids is a bad thing too. Genetic alteration to fix something that could hurt someone all of their life, well, I feel a bit different about that cuz if this stuff would have happened sooner, I would probably still have a vibrant grandma instead of a invalid grandma.

Good News...

[mrgaribaldi]

Indeed this is good news however genetic manipulation is not something to be taken lightly. While at the moment this child has been cured what are the side effects of such a treatment later in life? What is to say that this won't spawn some new disease that affects the rest of use.

I fear the use of technology that we do not understand.

Apologies if I sound alarmist.

God's Biotech Lab...

[gnovos]

I don't remembering God *having* a biotech lab, or at least it wasn't mentioned in any bible *I'VE* ever heard of... (Though, perhaps it's in $cientology's secret documents)

UNTIL we can manipulate ALL REALITY with only the power of WILL, we will NOT be be coming anywhere close to "playing god".

Disturbing?

[paranoid.android]

And how is genetic engineering (or, at least, the type described in the article) disturbing? It almost certainly saved this baby's life, and prevented him from suffering a short, isolated existence in a plastic bubble, not to mention the psychological trauma of an accidental viewing of this piece of dreck.

Re:Disturbing?

[Jouster]

My statement was to defend my use of the word "disturbing". I feel it is most certainly disturbing that we are facing a technology that may one day destroy that which we think of as "human". I certainly don't think--and even more stridently, don't hope--that that will be the case, but the possibility exists. Just as the discovery of the principles of atomic energy allowed us to produce massive amounts of power at exceedingly low cost, it could just as easily have meant an end to every intelligent being on the planet.

Thus, is the discovery of these new bioengineering principles disturbing? Possibly; I certainly believe so, but it could be argued. Unsettling? Without a doubt. We can no longer sit on our rear ends and let our children and our children's children decide what to do with this technology; it just landed in our laps. Will we use it to cure cancer, to prevent genetic ailments, to identify those who will suffer from male pattern baldness? Or will we use it to replace humanity with a homogenized mass of tissue, each unit performing the task for which it is programmed?

Jouster

Uh, no.

[bani]

Remember that one of the arguments against vaccination when it was discovered, was that we shouldn't be "playing god". Eg people should just accept death by lethal contagious viruses like smallpox -- vaccination is "playing god".

Just about every significant medical discovery has been opposed with the "playing god" argument.

Name me one...

[Convergence]

Name me one thing in nature we fully understand. Name me one thing.

We don't know, *for sure* how atoms work or are built. We don't know if there is a 5th repulsive force in nature. There's lots we don't know..

But what we do know.... To our knowledge, this therapy may help a guy who's *never* had a chance to go out into real life. Maybe it'll give him cancer in 30 years. Maybe it won't.. But just because it might possibly be catastrophic doesn't mean that nothing should be done.

That way leads to stagnation and helplessness. We don't know and can't know. That is why this so-called 'precautionary principal', that something must be proved 'safe' before it can be used or sold is garbage. We can't know and won't know for *sure* anything.

Re:Name me one...

[k98sven]

We can't know and won't know for *sure* anything.

How interesting.. this is called relativism (not the Einstein kind)

Now, I would like to ask you, does that statement apply to itself?
If yes, then we can't be sure that everything is unsure
- which renders the possibility that things indeed can be known for sure.

If no, then you are assuming that at least one thing -can- be known for sure,
which means that other things may be as well.

In short: That is a self-contradictory statement.

Also, in stating that we don't know most things
-for sure- , you seem to imply that everything is equally uncertain. This is not the case.

For example, for the last 500 years or so, we have known that the earth orbits the sun, and not vice-versa.
Of course we can't be -absolutly certain- this is the case, but I'd say that it would be very unlikely for the opposite to be proved.

Science is not about solid truths, nor has it ever been:
It's about knowing things with a known degree of certainty.

How about "playing god", not "Playing God"

[Bowfinger]

FWIW, my comment was taken more literally and more negatively than I intended. Sorry for provoking people.

I'm not suggesting for a minute that we stop. I am truly in awe of what they have accomplished, and the incredible potential for improving human lives. I thought this was an exciting story, and I am happy for the boys who suffer from this disease. Maybe it's because I'm more of a physical sciences kind of guy, but thought of being able to mainipulate individual human genes, effectively retroactively as I understood this, is just mind-boggling. If we're advanced enough to pull this off, are there any limits to what we can do?

And that is where the negative side of my comment comes from. What are the limits to what we can do, and (rhetorically) are we up to the responsibilty? The answer is "no" - though the prospects for good are unlimited, some will abuse this technology. It's the inevitable cloud that accompanies the silver lining.

In my opinion, that's part of the price we pay for advancing. Genetic manipulation seems much like our first steps into atomic power (another subject that provoked fears of "playing God"). It is far more revolutionary than medications or cutting trees or most of the other ways we manipulate our world. These other things can have tremendous cumulative effect due to scale, but their potential individually is fairly narrow and limited. A new drug may heal - or hurt - a few individuals, but it can't change the shape of the human race.

Genetic manipulation is different. It can literally change the face of humanity. The potential for good is awesome, but it will come with a price. And that's the risk we accept every time we move forward.

Again, sorry for provoking a religious discussion. My use of "playing God" was only meant as a metaphor for the power and potential of this development.

Survival of the Weakest

[ari_j]

As in favor as I am of stem cell and other genetic research and, more importantly, applications being found for the results of that research, curing a disease that causes such a massive immune system failure has to be done at the source: it's a genetic thing, as far as I know, so we have to let these people die. Keeping them around may be humanitarian. Curing their disease may make living worthwhile and hopefully can let them contribute to society. Letting them reproduce, however, will weaken our gene pool; and now that they can come out of their bubbles, they'll be reproducing even more. Just like cancer cells in an otherwise healthy body: the unwanted units become more and more pervasive and harder to contain or remove.

Re:Other points

[mekkab]

Ahhh, I see you read a little washington post magazine while on the can this Sunday!

However your argument is a gross generalization on both fronts. To go O.T. for sec, the Deaf article is not just commenting on the desireability of a physical conidition (not being able to hear) but of the fierce culture that has associated itself around it. They (the capital-d Deaf) stick together like birds of a feather.
I don't know how fostering one's own community is stetting the pace of progress back, but YMMV.

back on topic- to extrapolate from this gene experiment where we have no long term data to establish its true efficacy to a Gattica-type dystopia is almost trolling as a luddite. Just like the "we shouldn't play God!" troll, we have to realize its out of our hands. Technology is neither good nor bad.

And if you live in America, you have nothing to worry about, since it will either be outlawed, the funding will be cut, or Hollywood will legislate what genes you can use. Whoops, sorry! This isn't a DMCA/RIAA/CBDBTA/TINSTAAFL article!

Re:Other points

[ostiguy]

Dude, when I was in high school, the dumb kids hung out together. Do you advocate allowing parents to genetically engineer dumb kids so the dumb community doesn't get upset?

ostiguy