Phage therapy research in the West has accelerated in recent years. In practical terms, treatment options remain reserved for compassionate cases — but of the 29 such cases reported since 2000, half occurred after 2017. This spike follows two high-profile success stories; in 2019, Graham Hatfull, professor of biotechnology at the University of Pittsburgh, United States, had a collection of phages and the expertise that helped save the life of a girl, aged 15 years, with cystic fibrosis, whose Mycobacterium abscessus infection had persisted even after a double lung transplant. He was able to build upon the clinical knowledge of the infectious disease team at the University of California, United States, who, in 2015, had successfully tackled a highly antibiotic-resistant and deadly Acinetobacter baumannii infection by identifying a phage counteragent.
Compassionate use is spreading; France, the United States, Australia, Belgium and Poland have each established legal precedence of approval for compassionate phage therapy, and the original home of phage therapy, Georgia, arranges treatment for international patients — reflecting the growing recognition of their use. In 2018, the United States opened the first Western clinical phage base: the Center for Innovative Phage Applications and Therapeutics at the University of California San Diego School of Medicine, and recently received a US Food & Drug Administration approval for a phase I/II clinical trial on intravenous phage use as an adjunct treatment. Clinical use of ‘phage banks’ are also under review, in the hope of speeding up patient care by drawing on a library of pre-approved phage options.
PHAGElogist 