Blood
Israel Moves Blood Bank Underground to Safeguard It From Attacks
RAMLA, Israel — When the sirens warning of incoming rockets split the skies, Israel’s national blood bank moves into high alert to keep the nation’s blood supply safe. The heavy machinery for blood processing, plasma freezers and centrifuges are transferred to a basement bomb shelter, a cumbersome operation that takes 10 to 12 hours. That […]
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A Woman Is Cured of H.I.V. Using a Novel Treatment
A bone marrow transplant is not a realistic option for most patients. Such transplants are highly invasive and risky, so they are generally offered only to people with cancer who have exhausted all other options. There have only been two known cases of an H.I.V. cure so far. Referred to as “The Berlin Patient,” Timothy […]
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A Gene Sequencing Pioneer Battles Over What It Can Buy
Illumina, the leading maker of gene-sequencing machines, is tiny compared with the tech giants of Silicon Valley. But like Google and Facebook, Illumina now finds itself in the cross hairs of antitrust enforcers in the United States and Europe. The company bought Grail, a promising start-up in a related business that does not really exist […]
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These Prenatal Tests Are Usually Wrong When Warning of Rare Disorders
A big market for rare conditions Between 2011 and 2013, a small Silicon Valley-based biotech company, Sequenom, tripled in size. The key to its success: MaterniT21, a new prenatal screening test that did remarkably well at detecting Down syndrome. Older screening tests took months and required multiple blood tests. This new one generated fewer false […]
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