Gene Therapy's Breakthrough Week: Triumph, Tragedy, and the Race to Scale

A 6-year-old girl named Mei died seven days after receiving trillions of virus particles carrying a base editor to correct a neurodevelopmental genetic mutation — and the death was quietly buried for over a year. The experimental gene-editing therapy, costing her parents more than $800,000, was administered by neuroscientist Qiu Zilong at Shanghai Jiao Tong University. The case, exposed by Science and Retraction Watch, has triggered a university investigation and reignited...