Image what it would be like if doctors could cure Huntington's disease, muscular dystrophy, or even hemophilia. With gene therapy this all could be reality in the near future.
Gene therapy is a potential approach to the treatment of genetic disorders in humans.
This type of gene therapy does not prevent the disease from occurring in the next generation because it does not affect the sperm and egg cells. Somatic cell gene therapy only effects the other body cells. Somatic cell gene therapy has to be done several times over the coarse of the patient's life because the effects do not last very long. The contrast of somatic cell gene therapy is germline therapy. Germline therapy takes place in the reproductive cells.