Multiple research papers indicate that many Filipinos suffer from asthma. A study from the National Library of Medicine reports that 1 in 10 children in the Philippines have the disease.
The European Respiratory Review also says drug costs are 75% higher in the Philippines as a proportion of total direct costs. Fortunately, a Chinese trial may offer a more practical treatment.
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Tsinghua University experts performed a successful animal trial for a single-shot asthma cure. As a result, repeated costly treatments may become a thing of the past.
How does the asthma cure work?
South China Morning Post reported about this wondrous medical discovery from research fellow Peng Min and his colleagues.
They found IL-4, IL-5, and IL-13 cytokines were responsible for roughly half of asthma patients. Cleveland Clinic defines cytokines as “signaling proteins that help control inflammation in your body.”
Excessive cytokines may lead to more inflammation and other conditions like autoimmune diseases. Nowadays, there are medical products that target these proteins and treat severe asthma.
However, they require lifelong dosing. That is why Peng’s team developed an asthma cure called CAR-T that targets these cytokines.
The acronym stands for Chimeric Antigen Receptor T-cell Therapy, which adjusts a patient’s killer T-cells. These are white blood cells that fight infection.
CAR-T enables T-cells to recognize and destroy enemies like cancer cells. Recent tests showed it suppressed lung inflammation and asthma symptoms for more than a year in mice.
Interesting Engineering reported that Bart Lambrecht, a medical expert from Ghent University in Belgium, called for further study.
The animal study is encouraging, but making the asthma cure safe for human patients will involve significant challenges.
“The biomarkers or clinical characteristics that would predict the superiority of the new CAR-T cell therapy over existing biological medical products remains to be studied,” Lambrecht noted.