▲ Medical staff collecting samples
On the morning of the 27th, a medical team is collecting a sample at a temporary screening test center for COVID-19 installed in the Plaza of Seoul Station.
According to the Central Defense Response Headquarters, as of 00:00 on the same day, 318,130 new cases of COVID-19 in Korea, 282 deaths per day, and 1,216 patients in critical condition. 2022.3.27 Yonhap News
US and Canada joint research team
Development of candidate substances for ‘nasal spray’
All 10 ‘rat experiments’ survived
Can you prevent and treat the novel coronavirus infection (COVID-19) by spraying your nose?
A joint research team in the United States and Canada announced that they have succeeded in developing a nasal spray candidate that can prevent and treat COVID-19.
It is expected that the US FDA will be able to begin the process for emergency use approval within six months at the earliest.
According to the international academic journal Nature on the 28th (local time), this therapeutic spray candidate was named ‘N-0385’, announced by a joint research team at the University of British Columbia in Canada and Cornell University in the United States.
N-0385 inhibits infection by blocking the activity of certain human enzymes that the virus uses to infect host cells.
The enzyme N-0385 targets is present in the nasal cells, where the virus primarily invades.
According to the research team, the strength of this compound is that it is not significantly affected by the COVID-19 mutation, so it can be useful in defense once morest virus strains in the future.
“Coronavirus continues to evolve… A new variant every year” prospect
Previously, there was a forecast that the COVID-19 virus, which repeats re-spreading with various mutations, will evolve in a direction to avoid immunity in the future.
Sarah Covey, a professor at the University of Chicago who studies virus evolution, said in a column published in the New York Times on the same day, “There is no reason why viruses should not continue to evolve, at least from a biological point of view.”
Viruses such as ‘SARS-CoV-2’, which cause COVID-19, are focused on spreading more widely.
Scientists predicted that the virus would evolve in the direction of increasing contagiousness from the beginning of the Corona 19 crisis, but the actual evolution was at a level that exceeded this, the column diagnosed.
In order to spread the COVID-19 virus well, it has evolved not only to increase its contagiousness, but also to evade immunity.
It is said that reinfection can occur by disrupting the immune system of people who have been vaccinated or already infected and have formed antibodies.
However, researchers at the University of British Columbia tested four variants of N-0385, including delta, in human lung cells, organoids and tissue cultures, and found that N-0385 inhibited infection without evidence of toxicity. .
N-0385 does not show significant toxicity because it does not enter the cell and blocks the surface entry of the virus.
▲ Where is the end of COVID-19?
Medical staff are collecting samples at the temporary screening center for COVID-19 in Seoul Station Square on the 18th. 2022.3.18 Yonhap News
Nasal spray ‘rat experiment’, all 10 animals survived
In addition, researchers at Cornell University in the US conducted a nasal spray experiment using genetically engineered mice.
The researchers infected mice and administered the compound as a nasal spray for four days. As a result, all 10 mice treated with the compound survived, but the survival rate of the control group was only 20%.
In addition, it not only inhibited the infection of COVID-19, but also showed a protective effect when administered within 12 hours of exposure to the virus.
Although this study mainly focused on alpha, beta, gamma, and delta mutations, the researchers believe that microns may also work.
Dr. Francois Jean, who led the study, said, “N-0385 showed a result of blocking omicron mutation infection in human lung cells.”
“This compound has the potential to be used as a broad-spectrum therapeutic for viruses with the same infection mechanism, including influenza viruses such as influenza A and C.”
Reporter Kim Chae-hyun