A baby girl who was close to dying from cancer has been rescued by a cell therapy envisioned as a “one size fits all” treatment that had never been tested in people, doctors reported on Thursday.

The development is significant because it indicates that cell therapies, which represent an exciting new front in the battle against cancer, might not have to be customized for each patient, saving time and money.

It also represents one of the first times that a novel “genome editing” technique has been used to treat someone. The therapy was developed by Cellectis, a French biotechnology company.

But it is hard to say much based on one patient. Also, the girl has been in remission for only a few months, too little time to say she has been cured, said Waseem Qasim, one of the doctors who treated her at the Great Ormond Street Hospital in London.