Russia has developed a drug for the treatment of hepatitis B based on gene editing

Russia has developed a drug for hepatitis B therapy based on CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing technology. This was announced on January 21 by Dmitry Kostyushev, head of the laboratory of genetic Technologies in the creation of medicines at Sechenov University.

"We have developed a new non-viral delivery system and, for the first time, have learned how to package CRISPR/Cas complexes with an efficiency of about 80%. 200-250 copies of antiviral complexes are placed in one nanoparticle — this is enough to remove all copies of the viral genome [hepatitis B] in an infected cell," the TASS news agency quoted him as saying.

It is noted that the drug is short—lived - it only works for 24 hours. In addition, particle delivery systems do not contain any foreign viral or bacterial components, so the immune system does not perceive them as a threat.

The safety of this technology has already been proven today. It is assumed that in the coming years people will be able to receive the drug.

The news is being updated