Researcher names potent lifesaving virus after soldier boyfriend killed in Gaza War
As antibiotic-resistant bacteria pose growing health risk, Hebrew University scientists search for ‘good’ viruses and name them after heroes killed on or after Oct. 7
Reporter at The Times of Israel
When biotechnology student Sigal Vorzhev was researching at the Israeli Phage Therapy Center at Hebrew University, she discovered a new bacteriophage — or phage, for short — a virus that can kill specific bacteria.
Vorzhev and the IPTC team named the phage KpRaz1 as a tribute to her boyfriend, the late Master Sgt. (res.) Raz Abulafia, who was killed at the age of 27 while fighting the Hamas terror group in Gaza on November 13, 2023.
After the war in Gaza broke out when some 3,000 Hamas-led terrorists stormed southern Israel, killing 1,200 people and kidnapping 251 to the Strip, the IPTC decided to name new phages in memory of those killed in the war.
So far, the center has named phages after Alon Shimriz, a hostage who was accidentally killed in Gaza, Yanai Kaminka and Arnon Zmora, two soldiers who fell in the war against Hamas, and other heroes.
Abulafia, too, “was a hero who fought to save lives, and this phage might one day save lives,” Vorzhev, 25, told The Times of Israel.
Antibiotic-resistant bacteria: a global health crisis
The rise of antimicrobial resistance has become a global health challenge.
Around the world, these bacteria that defy antibiotics — commonly known as “superbugs” — were directly responsible for 1.27 million global deaths in 2019, according to the World Health Organization.
As early as 2013, a State Comptroller’s report found that some 5,000 Israelis were dying annually from infections associated with bacterial resistance. And those numbers continue to rise.
The need for a solution has become increasingly urgent as more bacteria become resistant to antibiotic treatment. During the war in Gaza, dozens of soldiers became infected with these superbugs. One soldier, Hanan Drori, died from a grave fungal infection.
The IPTC was established in 2018 in partnership with Hadassah Medical Center. Led by Prof. Ran Nir-Paz at Hadassah Hebrew University Medical Center and Prof. Ronen Hazan of the Faculty of Dental Medicine at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, the center focuses on the therapeutic potential of phages that target and kill bacteria with precision, offering a potential solution to the growing crisis of antibiotic resistance.
“Phages are good viruses,” said 28-year-old PhD student Ortal Yerushalmy, who is responsible for the IPTC’s vast and diverse collection of more than 600 phages in its phage bank. “They infect and kill specific bacteria. In other words, the enemy of my enemy is my friend, right?”
The history of phages
In 1917, a French-Canadian microbiologist, Félix d’Hérelle, was the first to discover that bacteriophages — from the Ancient Greek phagein, to devour, and bacteria — destroyed the bacteria that caused dysentery.
“But once penicillin was discovered,” said Yerushalmy, “scientists thought they were finished with the bacterial problem and phages were not needed anymore.”
As a result, phage research was neglected in the Western world, she said. “However, they were still used for therapy in Georgia and other Eastern European countries.”
Over the years, as bacteria have become resistant to antibiotics, researchers realized they needed more solutions.
“So, recently, we came back to phages,” Yerushalmy said.
An early innovator in phage research, Tel Aviv University microbiologist Eugene Rosenberg used phages to treat bacterial infections in coral reefs in the Red Sea and the Great Barrier Reef in Australia in the early 2000s.
Recently, phage therapy has gained respect as one of the most effective solutions in treating pathogenic bacterial infections. Several centers around the world, including the IPTC, now use phage therapy in human medicine as well as in veterinary medicine, agriculture and other fields.
Major phage centers share their information with other global researchers, and Yerushalmy noted that there hasn’t been any anti-Israel boycott of the IPTC.
However, an article in an academic journal about phage research in the Middle East mentioned Iran, Egypt and Turkey, but not Israel.
The first successful phage treatment in Israel
In 2018, an Israeli taxi driver contracted a polymicrobial infection after unsuccessful antibiotic treatment.
After exhausting all other treatments, Hadassah Medical Center doctors, together with Hazan’s phage therapy lab, tried experimental phage therapy. In a few weeks, Yerushalmy said, he was cured of his infection. It was the first successful phage therapy treatment in Israel.
While antibiotics can be used for general infections, Yerushalmy said phage therapy targets specific bacteria. Trying to match phages with bacteria is a lengthy process, and the therapy is still in its experimental stages.
“Phages are not supposed to replace antibiotics,” the phage center’s co-director, Hazan, told The Times of Israel. “If they are still our best weapon, why replace them? We can use them both.”
Until now, IPTC phages have been used to treat about 30 patients in Israel and the world with a success rate of 80%.
Today, several Israeli start-ups use phage technology, including BiomX. Traded on the New York Stock Exchange, BiomX develops treatments designed to target and destroy harmful bacteria in chronic diseases, including cystic fibrosis.
Still saving lives
Vorzhev conducted her research at the IPTC with two other students, Shira Meuchas-Heilbron and Ruth Renana Lipszyc, under Yerushalmy’s supervision.
Their work was part of an international consortium whose aim is to find phages that target antibiotic-resistant Klebsiella pneumoniae. These strains are major pathogens in hospital-acquired infections.
In this study, Vorzhev discovered the new phage that she named for Abulafia, which might be used to treat difficult cases of Klebsiella pneumoniae in the future.
“Raz was a good person. He was always, always helping people and animals.” Vorzhev said, before pausing. “This is like closure. Raz saved lives when he was alive, and now that he’s gone, I really hope that with this phage, he will continue saving lives.”
