> The gene therapy consists of a harmless virus carrying new otoferlin genes in two drops of liquid that are delicately injected down the length of the cochlea, delivering the genes to each hair cell.
You just squirt some medicine near the cells, and then the cells are sorted? This is no explanation at all.
You could say, 'the cells absorb the protein and as the completes the bio-circuit, it is now activated correctly and the patient can hear'. Obviously I just made that up! But how does the thing work?
Eg, if this was cancer and you operated to take the cancer out, fine - I get the principle. It if it's chemo, you insert some chemicals typically and it kills the cancerous growth, I get that too.
But what is the gene therapy doing, at an engineering level? It's a mystery to me.
Frankly, while I can understand a gene therapy working when treating a fetus, I don't get how it can work once the cells are developed and in place. I'm sure I'm dumb, but there it is.
The whole article reads like a gene therapy promo, with no details that help understanding what the treatment is. You might as well say 'magic'.