Why reports about CRISPR’d cells and cancer shouldn’t be ignored

Why reports about CRISPR’d cells and cancer shouldn’t be ignored

STAT Plus: Why reports about CRISPR’d cells and cancer aren’t calamitous — but shouldn’t be ignored

By SHARON BEGLEY

STAT’s story about CRISPR-edited cells often lacking a functional gene known to prevent cancer caused a bit of a stir. On Wall Street, some investors dumped sharesof Editas Medicine, CRISPR Therapeutics, and Intellia (the three pure-CRISPR plays; other companies are pursuing other forms of genome-editing). Social media delivered the expected blowback, apparently because we dared to raise the possibility that it might possibly be necessary to test possibly CRISPR’d cells for possiblecancer-causing changes. We’re doing an online chat about all this next week, but in case you can’t wait:

Cut to the chase: Is this the death knell for CRISPR? No. Not even close.

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