Moments of Truth
His company Semma was founded in 2014, a mix of Sam and Emma’s names.
One challenge was to figure out how to grow islet cells in large quantities with a method others could repeat. That took five years.
The company, led by Bastiano Sanna, a cell and gene therapy expert, tested its cells in mice and rats, showing they functioned well and cured diabetes in rodents.
At that point, the next step — a clinical trial in patients — needed a large, well financed and experienced company with hundreds of employees. Everything had to be done to the exacting standards of the Food and Drug Administration — thousands of pages of documents prepared, and clinical trials planned.
Chance intervened. In April 2019, at a meeting at Massachusetts General Hospital, Dr. Melton ran into a former colleague, Dr. David Altshuler, who had been a professor of genetics and medicine at Harvard and the deputy director of the Broad Institute. Over lunch, Dr. Altshuler, who had become the chief scientific officer at Vertex Pharmaceuticals, asked Dr. Melton what was new.
Dr. Melton took out a small glass vial with a bright purple pellet at the bottom.
“These are islet cells that we made at Semma,” he told Dr. Altshuler.
Image
Vertex Pharmaceuticals’ headquarters in Boston.Credit…Bill Sikes/Associated Press
Vertex focuses on human diseases whose biology is understood. “I think there might be an opportunity,” Dr. Altshuler told him.
Meetings followed and eight weeks later, Vertex acquired Semma for $950 million. With the acquisition, Dr. Sanna became an executive vice president at Vertex.
The company will not announce a price for its diabetes treatment until it is approved. But it is likely to be expensive. Like other companies, Vertex has enraged patients with high prices for drugsthat are difficult and expensive to make.
Vertex’s challenge was to make sure the production process worked every time and that the cells would be safe if injected into patients. Employees working under scrupulously sterile conditions monitored vessels of solutions containing nutrients and biochemical signals where stem cells were turning into islet cells.
Less than two years after Semma was acquired, the F.D.A. allowed Vertex to begin a clinical trial with Mr. Shelton as its initial patient.
Like patients who get pancreas transplants, Mr. Shelton has to take drugs that suppress his immune system. He says they cause him no side effects, and he finds them far less onerous or risky than constantly monitoring his blood sugar and taking insulin. He will have to continue taking them to prevent his body from rejecting the infused cells.
But Dr. John Buse, a diabetes expert at the University of North Carolina who has no connection to Vertex, said the immunosuppression gives him pause. “We need to carefully evaluate the trade-off between the burdens of diabetes and the potential complications from immunosuppressive medications.”
Mr. Shelton’s treatment, known as an early phase safety trial, called for careful follow-up and required starting with half the dose that would be used later in the trial, noted Dr. James Markmann, Mr. Shelton’s surgeon at Mass General who is working with Vertex on the trial. No one expected the cells to function so well, he said.
“The result is so striking,” Dr. Markmann said, “It’s a real leap forward for the field.”
(https://static01.nyt.com/images/2021/11/16/science/00diabetes5/merlin_197344905_89a8f5dc-a175-4cd9-84fb-e0f530fc2547-articleLarge.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale)
Mr. Shelton recalls shedding tears when he checked his blood sugar levels after having a meal following his procedure.Credit…Amber Ford for The New York Times
Last month, Vertex was ready to reveal the results to Dr. Melton. He did not expect much.
“I was prepared to give them a pep talk,” he said.
Dr. Melton, normally a calm man, was jittery during what felt like a moment of truth. He had spent decades and all of his passion on this project. By the end of the Vertex team’s presentation, a huge smile broke out on his face; the data were for real.
He left Vertex and went home for dinner with Sam, Emma and Ms. O’Keefe. When they sat down to eat, Dr. Melton told them the results.
“Let’s just say there were a lot of tears and hugs.”
For Mr. Shelton the moment of truth came a few days after the procedure, when he left the hospital. He measured his blood sugar. It was perfect. He and Ms. Shelton had a meal. His blood sugar remained in the normal range.
Mr. Shelton wept when he saw the measurement.
“The only thing I can say is ‘thank you.’”