Novartis and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation are collaborating to discover and develop a single-administration gene therapy for curing sickle cell disease.

Novartis will contribute its gene therapy and drug discovery knowhow while the Gates Foundation will provide funding for the effort, which hopes to produce a gene therapy for sickle cell disease that can be more easily delivered at scale.

The effort aims to deliver an in vivo gene therapy that involves a single, direct-to-patient administration and eliminates the need to modify cells in a lab. Novartis said it will work to address access and distribution challenges faced by low- and middle-income countries.