# Bengal doctors treat thalassaemia, brain cancer with advanced therapies 2026-08-23T12:30:18+00:00 | Health & Science | Indian Opinion Desk Corroboration: 1 independent outlet Doctors at Narayana Health in West Bengal have treated a seven-year-old boy with HbE Beta thalassemia using a haplo-cord transplant, making him transfusion-free. The child’s parents underwent IVF and genetic testing under the ‘Save the Sibling’ programme to produce a matched thalassemia-free sibling whose cord blood was used, along with stem cells from the father. The child developed complications during transplant but recovered fully. In a separate case, a 62-year-old man from Myanmar with primary CNS lymphoma, a rare brain cancer, was successfully treated with CAR T-cell therapy after high-dose chemotherapy failed. He received a dual CAR targeting CD19 and CD22. Both patients are now recovering well, according to senior consultant Joydeep Chakrabartty, who called the outcomes landmark achievements. Prasanta Chowdhury, laboratory director at Cord Life Sciences, noted that cord blood banking involves complex medical and ethical debates, but both cases were handled with clarity and compassion. ## Indian Opinion Analysis Thalassemia is a genetic blood disorder requiring lifelong transfusions in severe cases. The haplo-cord technique, combining a half-matched donor with cord blood, is a relatively new approach that reduces graft rejection risk when a fully matched donor is unavailable. CAR T-cell therapy, while approved for blood cancers, is rarely used for primary CNS lymphoma. The success in these cases could encourage wider adoption in India, where both therapies remain costly and limited to select centres. Narayana Health is among the few Indian hospitals offering both procedures. The next milestone will be long-term follow-up data on relapse-free survival for these patients. ## Coverage - thehindu.com Straight news report of medical achievements, quoting doctors and a laboratory director, no editorial slant. This story was synthesised by AI from the source linked above. Tags: Joydeep Chakrabartty, Narayana Health, Prasanta Chowdhury, West Bengal Canonical: https://indianopinion.org/bengal-doctors-treat-thalassaemia-brain-cancer-with-advanced-therapies/ License: Summary and commentary (c) Indian Opinion, reusable with attribution. Facts belong to the linked sources. Cite: https://indianopinion.org/bengal-doctors-treat-thalassaemia-brain-cancer-with-advanced-therapies/#story-in-brief Review state: restored archive article, accurate at time of publication, not offered to search indexes. How this brief was made: an AI model read the report linked above and wrote this summary and analysis, which were published automatically. Published briefs are sampled every hour by an automated quality check; the editor verifies its findings and approves corrections, and corrected briefs carry a dated correction line. We do no original reporting. Methodology: https://indianopinion.org/ai-use-policy/