FDA Approves Isis’ Gene-Based Drug

Isis Pharmaceuticals Inc. of Carlsbad has won approval to sell the first of a new kind of drug that treats disease by switching off genes. The drug, Vitravene, slows down a serious eye infection that can blind people with AIDS. The approval by the Food and Drug Administration cheered researchers who have spent three decades trying to prove that such treatments were possible. Drug and biotechnology companies around the world are developing drugs that work in a similar way, and several of these compounds have entered advanced human testing for diseases such as cancer and arthritis. The new treatments are called “antisense” drugs. These are tiny bits of laboratory-made genetic material with the ability to gum up some of the genes that come into play in a particular disease. Isis shares rose 56 cents to close at $9.81 on Nasdaq.