Hopes for non-viral gene therapy take a blow as Generation Bio announces significant setback
Last year, during the height of the biotech IPO boom, Generation Bio raised $230 million on a swing-for-the-fences approach to gene therapy.
Launched out of UMass Medical School, the company promised to develop the world’s first non-viral gene therapy. Such an approach, if proven, could eliminate many of the key hurdles that have hindered the field over the last decade: It would allow doctors to dose patients who have pre-existing immunity to the viruses commonly used today, to redose a patient if the therapy ever wore off, and to avoid many of the immune-related safety concerns that have come to the fore over the last 18 months.
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