A new study to combat chronic hepatitis B

Over 300 million people worldwide are affected by the chronic form of hepatitis B, one of the leading risk factors for liver cirrhosis and liver cancer. In patients with this chronic infection, the immune system fails to eradicate the virus responsible for the disease, which continues to survive and reproduce within liver cells. A group of researchers from Vita-Salute San Raffaele University, through close collaboration with the American start-up Asher Biotherapeutics, has tested a molecule capable of reactivating the immune system against chronic hepatitis B for the first time in the world in preclinical models.

The findings published today in the prestigious scientific journal Science Translational Medicine lay the groundwork for the development in the clinic of an immunotherapy for this serious disease. 

The study was coordinated by Professor Matteo Iannacone, director of the Division of Immunology, Transplantation and Infectious Diseases at San Raffaele Research Hospital, who returned to Italy after a long research experience in the United States, supported by a Career Development Award from the Armenise-Harvard Foundation.