Approximately 30 million people live with asthma in Europe and, despite research progress for treatments, asthma control remains suboptimal. As it is clear that new approaches for better disease management are needed, the CURE project arises with a completely novel way of treating the inflammation in the airways of asthma patients with a virus-based therapy, known as bacteriophages.
A European Commission Horizon 2020 funded project, CURE was launched in 2017 with 10 consortium partners, and it will run until October 2021. In 2019, we got to the crucial point where everything seems to be about to happen. Significant number of samples had been gathered for potential analyses. Based on the CURE data, it seems that the composition of the microbial ecology in the lungs has to do with a disease state: it is generally more stable in healthy people than people living with asthma. Understanding the composition of the respiratory microbiome, its dynamics and the interactions with the immune system are key to consider how to prevent the inflammation in asthma. Based on this knowledge, partners will identify the perfect combination of phages and build a mathematical model to predict the reaction of the body after a phage intervention, with the final aim of bringing back the microbiome to its “normal” state.
Being responsible for the projects’ communication and dissemination activities, EFA developed materials for internal and external use and managed the social media channels. Throughout 2019, we promoted latest research outcomes, increasing awareness on the projects’ work within the scientific and patient community.
