Marianne Guenot , 2025-04-17 10:28:00
On 16 September 2024 Jimi Olaghere became the first person with sickle cell disease to reach the summit of Mount Kilimanjaro. The 39 year old could hardly believe it as he contemplated his achievement from nearly 6000 m above sea level.“I was in shock. Five years ago, I couldn’t get out of bed,” Olaghere tells The BMJ. People with sickle cell disease are discouraged from venturing to areas above 3000 m, let alone to the top of Africa’s highest peak.Olaghere was one of the participants in Vertex Pharmaceuticals’ trial of exagamglogene autotemcel (exa-cel, brand name Casgevy), which works by editing a patient’s blood stem cells before they’re re-injected. In the phase 3 trial 29 of 30 (97%) participants with repeated vaso-occlusive crises—episodes when “sickled” red blood cells get stuck in blood vessels and cause pain—reported no crises and no related hospital admissions for at least a year.1Exa-cel isn’t the only…
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