Dusseldorf The EU wants to significantly facilitate the use of genetic engineering in agriculture. But the technology has long been used more and more in other areas: Genetic engineering should not only help to make plants resistant to diseases or climate change, but also to develop new therapies for diseases that were previously untreatable or only insufficiently treatable.
Genetic engineering promises new opportunities in medicine. Cell and gene therapy, for example, should make a breakthrough in the coming years with new processes. Defective genes in the human body are corrected in a targeted manner. The management consultancy Roland Berger predicts sales of 27.9 billion euros for the market in 2026. The US Food and Drug Administration expects 10 to 20 new cell and gene products to be approved each year by 2025.
An important milestone in 2012 was the development of the gene scissors Crisp/Cas. But as early as 1988, the first gene therapy study was officially approved in the USA. The technology is most promising in medicine for cancer and new innovative therapies.
But vaccines, for example against cervical cancer or tetanus, are now also genetically engineered. The technology has helped modify a gene in the human body to make it resistant to HIV, or ‘correct’ an inherited heart disease. The chances that the new treatments have are immense.
There were recently 365 drugs on the German market that were genetically engineered. Of the 63 active ingredients that were newly approved last year, there were 37. Of the newly approved drugs, every second is produced by genetically modified cells or microorganisms. In the meantime, such pharmaceutical products in Germany have a share of 32.9 percent of the total market and have a turnover of 17.8 billion euros.
Biontech develops cell therapy against cancer
The corporations are therefore investing more and more: Biontech, for example, is working on a cell therapy against cancer. The Mainz-based company takes endogenous killer cells from patients and equips them with a receptor in the laboratory so that they can better destroy cancer cells. At the same time, patients are equipped with a “booster” that activates all killer cells that have this receptor.
“Our goal is to offer cancer patients with an otherwise very poor prognosis a novel treatment option,” says Biontech founder Özlem Türeci.
The Mainz-based company is working on a cell therapy against cancer.
(Photo: imago images/Sämmer)
The Dax group Bayer is also setting high goals: The chemical and pharmaceutical group wants to generate “additional sales in the billions” in the medium term with products from cell and gene therapy. The company has spent billions on acquisitions and alliances in the field in recent years. Bayer is focusing primarily on the USA: 140 million dollars have been invested in the research center in Boston.
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North America is also the central location for gene therapies for Merck: In 2021, the group invested 23 million euros in a new building for the production of gene therapy products in California. The site has been active in this field since 1997, when the first clinical studies on gene therapy were started.
Merck helps other pharmaceutical companies to produce gene therapies and supplies them with precursors. “We are committed to accelerating the production of cell and gene therapies with the aim of bringing these life-saving treatments to patients more quickly,” says the Darmstadt-based group.
There is already a fear that Europe could fall behind, especially because clinical studies are easier to carry out in the USA: “In the field of gene therapies, Germany is in danger of falling behind as a location,” warns Jochen Maas, director of research and development at the French company pharmaceutical group Sanofi, which has one of its largest locations in Frankfurt.
There is also research on this in this country. However, the development of gene therapies is already taking place to a large extent in the USA and China. “Biotechnology is the future technology for Germany as a business location – and politicians should recognize this as quickly as possible,” says Maas.
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