17 Comments
Dec 28, 2022Liked by Josie Zayner, PhD

This is a Stat worthy piece with detailed information and some pithy conclusions. I can only hope that future therapies set a new downward trend on pricing but as Dr. Zayner points out the opposite trend is pretty strongly evident.

Expand full comment

We need control of this science, we need to all learn it so well we don’t need big pharma. We need to implement this in schools now- and for everyone- and FREE.

Expand full comment

Thank you for writing this!

My good friend and his wife "hacked" her own aggressive cancer using new (and old) techniques in immunotherapy. I will send you a copy (for the rest of yall it is https://www.amazon.com/Curing-Cancer-Immunotherapy-happened-attempted/dp/0997820012) .  The book is amazing because it not only nicely explains the treatment of cancer on a scientific basis but their own experimentation with immunotherapy.   Not to mention the non-scientific issues with trials and why certain simple cancer cures like Coley's toxins (it's just strep throat bacteria!)  are banned in the US.  It is a great compliment to your own journey!

I feel like The Odin can provide people with education and materials to at least develop their own cures but as you point out, the biggest problem is providing supervision and some way to test.  The Chees were able to work with the help of a couple of trusted physicians and it didn't hurt that the wife has a PhD in biology.  I wonder if you can develop a network of physicians to act as these trusted advisors for experimenters in general?

One of the easiest ways to minimize risk is to experiment on a substitute, but it is impossible to replicate a human because of the biological complexities.  Not sure if there are ways to "prove" that if a gene therapy works on a subset like a culture of cells, then you can safely assume it will work in a more complex biological environment.  I know Dr. Sofia discovered a cure for Hepatitis C that has very little side effects, not sure if you can "lift" that research to work for the general case -- you'd know more about that than me :)

Expand full comment

Its a combination of greed and regulatory capture.

Expand full comment

I suffer from a genetic disease myself and I think it's sick that companies generate such high earnings at the expense of people like me but regarding Zolgensma you don't take into account the fact that not every country conducts newborn screening for SMA, not every newborn is suitable for therapy if only because there are children in who the AAV virus can be destroyed in the body, so theoretically, a very expensive drug will not work, the things I have mentioned mean that despite 500 children with SMA in the US alone, the drug cannot be given to everyone every year and there are a few other conditions, sorry for my english but I'm writing with a translator :)

Expand full comment

Maybe we need an open source platform for gene therapy? It worked in computing to introduce real competition, and lower prices.

Expand full comment
Dec 29, 2022Liked by Josie Zayner, PhD

I had the same thought: open-source it. Universities are already making open-source COVID vaccines and open-source diagnostic tests, open-source therapy seems a next logical step. It will need to be led by academics or nonprofits though, industry will never do it (understandably so, I guess).

Expand full comment
author

We made an open source COVID vaccine and got banned from YouTube for it.

Expand full comment

Go to Rumble, Rumble keeps growing and they are unlikely to ban your video.

Also making a open source diy bioengineering wiki would be a good way to go making it widely available to the masses.

Expand full comment

Hmm... Maybe lack of oversight? No peer review, no IRB, no FDA. Good science should be reviewed by other scientists, more brains are (almost) always better. I'm not saying I necessarily agree with the current hierarchical (and disturbingly patriarchal) system of oversight, and I have no idea how to incorporate that into citizen science, but I do think it's important.

Expand full comment

Hi, I do not think N. Tesla was regulated... I'm so glad we have alternating current and so much more.

Midwives/healers who throughout human existence have given us generations of health services that were not in a box. At least that's what I think this conversation is about?

Expand full comment

Yes please!

Expand full comment

The amount of unnecessary suffering in this world infuriates me. I've seen it over and over again as a mental health professional and it continuously breaks my heart.

Expand full comment

Glad someone with a background in bio hacking is bringing this topic to the surface. There are quite a few interesting, rare and evil diseases that can be cured with modern science instead we use surgical intervention until patients can no longer tolerate it or by some chance get a cure. Some way, some how we need to move this along

Expand full comment

There is a coming in this area, fresh off the heels of open-source software and open-source hardware. I will be the martyr! :-D Cheers Senior Zayner!

Expand full comment

I know, but ... how else will they ever boot jack us in the neck and dominate our existence?

https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/harrypotter/images/9/9f/Magic_is_might.jpg

On a sincere note:

I thought I felt oppressed before... instead ...

I'd rather discuss how to FIX this??!!??

It's good to air our grievances ... but, how do we make a road map to freedom from the mighty boot-jack?

Is there a collaborative planning platform that can be used to make a plan for an open source version of these technologies?

If such a planning effort is successful, how do we defend the results against an assured legal pounding and thereby force the establishment to draw a clear line between technology and the right to own our own biology?

Expand full comment

This is a fascinating topic. I wish I understood it better. Thanks for your work!

Expand full comment