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Sammy Heung

The University of Hong Kong (HKU) has launched a clinical trial for a gene-related therapy aimed at treating chronic hepatitis B infection, giving patients hope for a cure in the future.
Professor Yuen Man-fung, chief of the division of gastroenterology and hepatology at HKU’s medical faculty, said on Thursday that existing medication for hepatitis B patients could only suppress the virus and had to be taken for decades.
He expected that the new treatment could enable patients to discontinue long-term medication.
“If we can suppress the virus and also eradicate the virus if possible, then the patients will not suffer or will have a minimal risk or lower risk of suffering from liver cancer development and cirrhosis or liver failure,” he said.
“And that obviously will bring hope … [to the] patients.”
Chronic hepatitis B affects more than 300 million people worldwide and is a primary cause of liver cirrhosis, cancer and liver failure. Around 6.2 per cent of the population of Hong Kong is affected by the condition.
Yuen said HKU was one of the three institutions invited by pharmaceutical companies to take part in the clinical trial and development of the treatment.
He said his team was currently at phases one and two of the clinical trial and had recruited nine patients in Hong Kong, with the first participant receiving a dose in March this year.
His team would need to collect data from patients, which would help them determine the suitable dosage and frequency of the treatment, he said, adding they were aiming to recruit 30 to 40 participants by the end of 2026.
“The patients are yet to be cured as we are still in the research stage,” he said. “We see the potential and hope that the new gene therapy can do so.”
He added that the phase three trial was expected to start two to three years later, but stopped short of saying when it would be completed.
Researchers said the hepatitis B virus would integrate with the human genome in the infected liver cells, making it difficult for current medications to completely eliminate the virus from the infected cells.

Yuen said the new therapy could target the virus gene, which could eradicate the virus inside the patient.
“The current therapy only suppresses the virus. So once you take off the medication, the virus will actually rebound, and then sometimes excessively, and cause further damage to the patients,” he said.
“The gene therapy, we saw the result in the mice experiment, can lower the surface antigen by at least 100-fold, and we expect that it will do the same thing in humans.”
Cheung Chi-fai, 50, was diagnosed with chronic hepatitis B when he was around 18 years old. He was the first patient in Hong Kong to receive the new gene-related therapy.
“After receiving the treatment, it was like I had a cold for a week and my body recovered afterwards,” he said.
“I hope that I can be cured of the disease and no longer need to take any medication after doing so for a few decades.”


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Hong Kong

Health & Environment

Existing medication only suppresses virus and has to be taken for decades, researcher says


Existing medication only suppresses virus and has to be taken for decades, researcher says.


Disease

Medicine

China

The University of Hong Kong

HKU launches clinical trial in Hong Kong to treat chronic hepatitis B patients

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Existing medication only suppresses virus and has to be taken for decades, researcher says

Existing medication only suppresses virus and has to be taken for decades, researcher says