“According to the company, that tiny edit should be enough to permanently lower a person’s levels of ‘bad’ LDL cholesterol, the fatty molecule that causes arteries to clog and harden with time. The patient in New Zealand had an inherited risk for extra-high cholesterol and was already suffering from heart disease. However, the company believes the same technique could eventually be used on millions of people in order to prevent cardiovascular disease.” Edits to a cholesterol gene could stop the biggest killer on earth. “In a first, a patient in New Zealand has undergone gene-editing to lower their cholesterol. It could be the beginning of new era in disease prevention.”