Krabbe Awareness Month: Day Seventeen

Krabbe Awareness - 17

There is hope. In addition to stem-cell transplants (which have been done for 2-3 decades), gene therapy for Krabbe is on the horizon!

You’ll have to Google gene therapy if you want a more scientific explanation, but essentially it corrects a typo. Example: Krabbe is caused by a lack of the GALC enzyme, so imagine the gene was spelled GACL – close but not correct; gene therapy takes the patient’s own cells, corrects the typo to be GALC, and puts the cells back into the body. The body then begins to produce the necessary enzyme with no risk of rejection.

It’s an incredible treatment already being used for other leukodystrophies!

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