‘A game-changer’: How Vertex delivered on cystic fibrosis
On Monday, Vertex Pharmaceuticals secured approval of a new cystic fibrosis drug. Margot Cleveland bought steaks.
She was in the mood to celebrate. Cleveland’s son, 10, was born with cystic fibrosis. He recently started taking an older Vertex medicine, but hopes to switch soon to the newly approved drug, called Trikafta. Life with cystic fibrosis was about to get a lot less stressful.
“When you first hear the diagnosis about your newborn, that’s the worst. You think the worst,” said Cleveland, an adjunct professor at the University of Notre Dame and a contributing writer to The Federalist. “But when Vertex’s first drug came out, we knew they had cracked the code and that a drug would eventually come for us. Now, I know that my son’s lungs will function as well as mine. That’s just unbelievable.”
The Food and Drug Administration’s press release announcing the Trikafta approval didn’t mince words. The medicine is a breakthrough for nearly every person living with cystic fibrosis.
Read more: 7 burning questions now that Biogen has resurrected its ‘failed’ Alzheimer’s drug
How Vertex came to invent Trikafta is an exceptional story. Few medicines are as effective, or as life-changing, as this one is expected to be. The basic research that led up to the
