August 17, 2005
Research: Cure
Question from Portland, Oregon, USA:
I was just reading about the Iacocca Foundation and their fight for a cure for type 1 diabetes. The theory is that they have a drug that will kill the bad white blood cells that attack the pancreas and, once they are killed, the pancreas will begin on its own to regenerate new islet cells. I guess it’s worked in mice. In your opinion, how promising does this sound and is this kind of a cure, if it were to come about, only for those who have just developed the disease? Would it benefit at all those who have been living with diabetes for years?
Answer:
There are many such projects, all in their infancy. Some are funded by the ADA, some by JDRF, some by NIH, some by private foundations like Iacocca. I suspect you are talking about the project at Massachusetts General Hospital. But, nobody knows if these project will work in people, what the side effects will be, exactly who and when candidates might be chosen, etc. It’s terrific that private foundations such as Iacocca’s will fund such projects when they do not get funding elsewhere. Time will tell whether or not they turn out to be interesting theories that do not work or can be developed to be safe and workable.
SB
