CRISPR has a milestone moment in treating blindness

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Good morning, readers.

Let’s talk about something that’s not coronavirus for just one second.

The world of CRISPR gene editing had a hallmark moment this week. For the first time ever, scientists have used the technology—which allows them to slice and dice portions of genetic code—inside of a person’s actual body.

This CRISPR therapy was developed by the gene-editing focused biotech Editas Medicine and its partner Allergan, the pharmaceutical giant best known for the cosmetic treatment Botox, and used to treat a patient at the Casey Eye Institute at Oregon Health & Science University with a rare genetic disease which causes blindness.

Within a month, researchers expect to see whether gene editing can literally restore sight to the blind.

What makes this such a milestone moment is the fact that, till now, CRISPR technologies haven’t been performed inside of an actual cell within a human body rather than a petri dish.

We’ll see what the ultimate results are. But the genomic revolution appears to plow forward unabated.

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Read on for the day’s news.

Sy Mukherjee
sayak.mukherjee@fortune.com
@the_sy_guy

DIGITAL HEALTH

Bristol-Myers Squibb and Voluntis team up on a digital cancer project. U.S. drug giant Bristol-Myers Squibb announced that it's teaming up with Voluntis, a digital health firm, in order to create apps that would help cancer patients keep track of their symptoms and monitor their disease. The ultimate goal, as with many digital health apps, wouldn't be to just passively track biometrics—but to offer personalized and real time advice to patients on how to manage their cancer.

Amazon may expand its virtual care clinics to Virginia employees. Washington Biz Journal reports that Amazon is eyeing an expansion of its virtual doctor visit service, Amazon Care, to its second headquarters in Virginia. That would require some regulatory wrangling in the commonwealth, but the service (which allows for employees to use a mobile app to chat and interact with their doctors) is already available at Amazon's Seattle HQ. (Washington Biz Journal)

INDICATIONS

Quest Diagnostics gets into the coronavirus testing space. Private companies are now beginning to join the likes of the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) approved labs in providing coronavirus testing. Quest Diagnostics, a juggernaut in the diagnostics space, said on Thursday that it would begin receiving samples for potential COVID-19 cases as soon as Monday. "Quest's national scale, diagnostic expertise and innovation, and relationships with half the country's physicians and health systems is a vital complement to the efforts of the CDC and other public health labs to contend with a growing number of suspected COVID-19 cases in the United States," said Quest CEO Steve Rusckowski in a statement.

THE BIG PICTURE

California declares state of emergency following first coronavirus death. California has declared a state of emergency after the first coronavirus-related death was reported in Los Angeles on Wednesday. The number of confirmed cases in the state now stands at 60, and there have now been at least 11 confirmed coronavirus linked deaths in the U.S. In case you haven't had a chance, check out my report on the complicated process of coronavirus testing. (Los Angeles Times)