The information: There’s a new costliest drug ever—a gene remedy that prices as a lot as a Brooklyn brownstone or a Miami mansion, and greater than the typical particular person will earn in a lifetime. Lenmeldy is a gene remedy for metachromatic leukodystrophy (MLD) and was authorised within the US on Monday. Its maker, Orchard Therapeutics, says the $4.25 million wholesale price displays the worth the remedy has for sufferers and households.

Why it issues:  MLD is a nerve dysfunction that strikes toddlers, shortly robbing them of their means to talk and stroll. Round half die, the others reside on in a vegetative state. But it surely’s extremely uncommon, affecting solely round 40 children a yr within the US. The intense rarity of such illnesses is what’s behind the hovering price-tags of latest gene therapies, and why promoting the most recent DNA remedy may very well be a shaky enterprise. Learn the total story.

—Antonio Regalado

New York Metropolis’s plan to cease e-bike battery fires

Stroll only a few blocks in New York Metropolis and also you’ll seemingly spot an electrical bike zipping by. They’ve develop into more and more standard in recent times, particularly amongst supply drivers. However the e-bike inflow has brought on a wave of fires sparked by their batteries, a few of them lethal.

Now, town desires to struggle these fires with battery swapping. A pilot program will present a small variety of supply drivers with different choices to energy up their e-bikes, together with swapping stations that provide absolutely charged batteries on demand. 

Proponents say this system might lay the groundwork for a brand new mode of powering small electrical autos within the metropolis, one which’s handy and will cut back the danger of fires. However the street to fireside security will seemingly be lengthy and winding given the sheer variety of batteries we’re integrating into our every day lives, in e-bikes and past. Learn the total story.