A promising new gene therapy, developed as a treatment for sickle-cell anemia, has been welcomed as a “very licit therapy” by the president of the National Catholic Bioethics Center.
The “Casgevy” therapy, the first such therapy to win federal approval in the US, uses genome-editing technology to modify the patient’s blood cells. It is available for use by patients 12 years old or older who face grave illness from the sickle-cell disease.
Dr. Joseph Meaney points out that while some gene-editing techniques are aimed to “human enhancement,” and have been condemned by the Church, this therapy is used simply to treat a disease.