of COVID-19 Pandemic It’s not over. In fact, it shows signs of lingering. a Long time.
But how politicians and health officials, if at all, continue to work on Current pandemicscientists have already Next 1. They scour the earth for animal viruses. SARS-CoV-2can jump into human populations and cause serious disease on a global scale.
they just found it.and it is dirty.
In 2020, a team of Russian scientists collected several horseshoe crabs in the Sochi National Park in southern Russia. The Russians have identified a new virus called Hosta-2 in those bats. Behaviorally, the virus appeared to have much in common with SARS-CoV-2.
Two years later, another team, including scientists from Washington State University and Tulane University, tested Khosta-2 alongside another newly discovered Russian bat virus to see if they could infect people. If so, whether our antibodies could stop them.
Initial results as described by the team new peer-reviewed research published last week in a scientific journal PLOS pathogen,worry. A second bat virus appeared to be less contagious. Hosta-2, on the other hand, liked human cells.
“We tested the extent to which these bat virus spike proteins infect human cells under different conditions,” the scientist wrote. “We have discovered that spikes from the virus Khosta-2 can infect. [the] Cells similar to human pathogens that use the same entry mechanisms. “
Equally troubling, Khosta-2 proved to be “resistant to neutralization by sera from SARS-CoV-2 vaccinated individuals.” In other words, our body’s defenses against COVID-19 may not protect us from the hypothetical disease caused by Khosta-2.
The meaning is clear. Better antibodies are needed to beat Khosta-2. “Our findings underscore the urgent need to continue developing new, broader protection … vaccines,” write the scientist behind the new study.
Like SARS-CoV-2 and hundreds of other so-called sarvecoviruses, Khosta-2 uses spike-like proteins on its surface to grab and infect host cells. However, most sarvecoviruses can only infect their normal host species. Usually bats.
Features of Khosta-2 special This means that, like SARS-CoV-2, it can also infect humans, at least in laboratory conditions. Why Khosta-2 is so scary Currently, it appears to be ignoring antibodies that work against SARS-CoV-2. Again, in lab conditions.
“The more we disrupt ecosystems and allow new mixes of species and viruses, the more we spin nature’s roulette wheel.“
— James Lawler, University of Nebraska Medical Center
There are many uncertainties here. The Tulane-Washington State University team did not attempt to infect real humans with her Khosta-2. To test for infection, they exposed the Russian bat virus to human cell cultures. To test potential immunity, they exposed the virus to her COVID antibodies. “You can only test what you can test,” Michael Letko, a virologist at Washington State University and one of the study’s authors, told The Daily Beast.
But immune tests in particular aren’t always representative of how our immune system actually works. “An individual’s immune response is multifaceted and includes innate and adaptive responses and cell-mediated immunity,” Letko said. “In this study, we only looked at antibody neutralization.”
So don’t panic just yet. There are many animal viruses, many of which are closely related to SARS-CoV-2 or at least use some of the same biological mechanisms to infect their hosts. Most people have never infected humans, and may not even be able to do so in real-life situations outside of a laboratory.
Further research could make Khosta-2 a scientific red herring. The virus is scarier than it looks. His James Lawler, an infectious disease specialist at the University of Nebraska Medical Center, told the Daily Beast:
However, it is undeniable that as the human population expands and clears more and more forests for farms and cities, it comes into close contact with more and more exotic animals. Encounters are opportunities for animal viruses to infect humans.
“In general, it could be said that many types of viruses pose an increased zoonotic risk,” Letko said. Consider the recent history of infectious diseases in the human population. SARS-CoV-2 is just latest Following avian influenza viruses, SARS-CoV-1, MERS, etc., animal viruses infect humans.
every reason to fear a pandemic rear COVID-19. Maybe Khosta-2 will be the next virus to hit us. The more we allow new mixes, the more we turn the roulette wheel of nature,” Lawler said. We must always be on the lookout and ready.
The most beneficial thing we can do, besides stopping the clearing of forests inhabited by bats and their viruses, is to develop vaccines that work against a wide range of similar pathogens. universal coronavirus vaccine It is in development that scientists hope will work against current and future variants of SARS-CoV-2.
Letko said the same “pancoronavirus” vaccine could also work against salve coronaviruses such as Hosta-2. I can’t say for sure until I test them. But as COVID funding dries up, intensive testing could become increasingly postponed.
And if these universal vaccines please do not You may need something completely new to counter Khosta-2 vax formulations, more broadly effective formulations. Barton Haynes, an immunologist at Duke University’s Human Vaccine Institute, which is developing a new pan-coronavirus vaccine, told The Daily Beast that the most likely outcome would be, together, to survey the entire host of coronaviruses. He said it would be a combination of separate jabs that could provide broad protection against
In that case, we may have competition on our hands.We could develop these brand new vaccines faster than some new salve coronavirus (whether it’s Khosta-2 or its as-yet-undiscovered cousin) becomes zoonotic and makes its leap to humanity. And can we actually have enough people? obtain A vaccine in time?
