Wuhan Institute of Virology, China. Photo: AFP 59 leading biological laboratories in the world The Wuhan Institute of Virology is among the most secure, often referred to as biosafety level 4, or BSL4. Such laboratory facilities are built to operate safely and securely against some of the world’s deadliest viruses and bacteria, which can cause serious diseases for which there is no cure or vaccine. . “There are air-conditioning filtration systems that prevent viruses from escaping through exhaust gases and wastewater, which are treated with chemicals or high temperatures to make sure nothing remains. at,” Gregory Koblentz, director of the Biosafety Program at George Mason University, told AFP. In addition, the researchers themselves are professionally trained and wear protective gear when conducting experiments. There are about 59 such biological laboratories around the world, a report co-led by Mr. Koblentz published this week said. “There are no mandatory international standards for safety, security and accountability standards for diseases,” the report said. Accidents can happen at any time Accidents can sometimes happen in even the world’s top facilities and are even more likely to happen in thousands of lower-end labs. The H1N1 virus – the same type of virus that caused the 1918 pandemic was leaked in 1977 in the Soviet Union and China, and then spread around the world. In 2001, a mentally challenged employee at an American laboratory sent parcels of anthrax spores across the United States, killing five people. Two Chinese researchers were exposed to the SARS virus in 2004 and spread the disease to others, killing one person. Lynn Klotz, a senior scientist at the Centers for Arms Control and Disarmament, has raised the alarm about the threat to the public from such experimental facilities. “Human errors account for more than 70% of errors in laboratories,” the researcher said. Controversy entitled “Strengthening the research function” There are controversies within the US government, which also funds the Wuhan coronavirus research program, and some independent scientists over whether gains of function – GOF) should be conducted. GOF studies focus on tailoring pathogens to make them more infectious, more dangerous, or easier to escape from treatments and vaccines – all with the aim of learning how to cope with them more effectively. This field has been going on for a long time. The debate heated up when, in 2011, two research groups showed that they could make avian influenza viruses more infectious in animals. Harvard epidemiologist Marc Lipsitch told AFP he was concerned that “would create a strain of the virus that, if it infects laboratory workers, not only kills the person but causes a pandemic”. “This study was not requested and does not contribute to the development of drugs or vaccines,” said molecular biologist Richard Ebright of Rutgers University, one of the strongest opponents of the type of research. this said. In 2014, the US government announced it would stop funding such research, but the process was criticized for its lack of transparency and trust. Late last year, a non-profit organization received funding from the US for research “to predict the risk of virus escaping from the laboratory” from corona virus in bats to humans in Wuhan. This week, before a question from Congress, experts Francis Collins and Anthony Fauci of the US National Institutes of Health also denied conducting activities to strengthen research functions.

The new variants were first spotted in countries like Brazil, South Africa and the UK that spontaneously appeared in the last few months of 2020. The main concern was a change in the mutant protein structure of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, known as E484K, in all three variants in the three countries, the researchers said. The E484K mutation is thought to impair the body’s immune response to the virus. Some scientists expressed concern that the E484K mutation could “elude” the natural immunity from SARS-CoV-2 infection and decrease the protection of existing Covid-19 vaccines. Artwork: Getty Images According to scientists interviewed by Reuters, the appearance of virus variants in different regions of the world shows that the SARS-CoV-2 virus is undergoing “convergent evolution”. Although SARS-CoV-2 will continue to mutate, they suspect the virus will have only a certain number of variants, immunologists and virologists say. However, it is still important to consider whether or not to limit the number of variants that make the SARS-CoV-2 virus less dangerous. “It can be said that the SARS-CoV-2 virus has a relatively limited number of variants that avoid antibodies before releasing the strongest ‘card’,” said Shane Crotty, virologist at La Institute of Immunology. Jolla in San Diego (USA) said. This could allow drug manufacturers to control disease while they develop the booster Covid-19 vaccine to suppress the current variant. Meanwhile, governments around the world are still struggling to control the pandemic that has killed nearly 3 million people globally. The opinion that the SARS-CoV-2 virus has only a certain amount of mutation has been the subject of discussion among experts since the beginning of February. According to a study, scientists have discovered seven variations of SARS. -CoV-2 appears in the US, has the same mutation. The convergent evolutionary process of SARS-CoV-2 According to Reuters, the process by which different species evolve similar traits to improve survival is central to evolutionary biology. The wide spread of the Covid-19 pandemic, with more than 128 million infections worldwide, allows scientists to observe the viral evolution in practice. “If you want to write a book about the evolution of viruses, you can do it now,” said Dr. Francis Collins, director of the US National Institutes of Health in an interview. Scientists saw the virus evolve on a smaller scale in 2018 when the H7N9 avian flu virus in China began adapting to a human host. However, there has never been a globally controlled virus such as SARS-CoV-2. Wendy Barclay, a virologist and professor at Imperial College London (UK), said she was amazed at the “staggering amount of convergent evolution” of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. “There are dangerous mutations like E484K, N501Y and K417N that all three variants in Brazil, South Africa and UK are carrying,” Ms. Barclay said. SARS-CoV-2 is not a “particularly smart” virus, the scientists said. Each time it infects people, SARS-CoV-2 makes copies of itself, and for each copy, it can make a mistake. While some of the mistakes are insignificant, the ones that give this virus an existential advantage tend to be long-lasting. “If this is repeated, it will provide some developmental advantages for the SARS-CoV-2 virus,” said Francis Collins. Some experts believe that the virus has a limited number of mutations that can be sustained before affecting its ability to function. Besides, too many mutations will cause the virus to no longer exist in the original version. “If the SARS-CoV-2 virus had an infinite number of ‘tricks,’ we would see a multitude of mutations,” said Michel Nussenzweig, an immunologist at Rockefeller University in New York. Cautious optimism However, the scientists remain cautious and say, predicting how much SARS-CoV-2 will mutate is a challenge. If there is a limit to how this virus can evolve, that would be simpler for the vaccine developers. The Novavax company is making adjustments to the vaccine to prevent variation in South Africa. However, trials have shown that the efficacy of the vaccine against the variant in South Africa is quite low. “The virus can mutate a lot and it still binds to a human host,” Novavax CEO Stan Erck said and hopes the vaccine will be effective for most of the current strains. According to Mr. Stan Erck, Novavax will continue to test vaccines for new strains of strains. Scientists have recently identified seven variants of SARS-Cov-2 in the US, with all mutations occurring in the same key location of the virus. This provides additional evidence of viral convergence evolution. Other research groups are working on exposing the virus to antibodies to force it to mutate. In many cases, the E484K mutation has appeared in the experiment. According to Reuters, the above evidence adds to the cautious optimism that the mutants appear to have many similar characteristics. However, experts say the world must continue to monitor for changes in the SARS-CoV-2 virus and eliminate its ability to mutate by reducing infection through vaccination and restrictive measures. the spread of the disease. “SARS-CoV-2 is still going very strong. We don’t know when the battle against the pandemic will end, ”said Vaughn Cooper, an expert in evolutionary biology at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine (USA).

While countries in turn closed their borders, scientists have broken their own borders, creating a global collaboration unlike anything that has happened in history. Never before have so many experts in many countries focused on a single topic and with such urgency, the researchers said. Nearly all other studies have to be halted. Within a few months, all of the global science was almost “COVIDed”. Photo: LG In a survey of 2,500 researchers in the US, Canada and Europe, Kyle Myers from Harvard and his team found that 32% turned their focus to pandemic. Neuroscientists studying olfaction are beginning to understand why patients with COVID-19 tend to lose their sense of smell. Physicists set out to create predictive models that inform policy-makers. Michael DL Johnson at the University of Arizona often studies copper’s toxic effects on bacteria. But knowing that nCoV existed on the copper surface for less time than other materials, he turned to investigating how vulnerable the virus might be to the metal. No disease has been so scrutinized by so many combined intelligence in such a short time. As of February 2021, the PubMed Biomedical Library listed more than 74,000 nCoV-related scientific articles – more than double those of articles on polio, measles, cholera, dengue, or other diseases. another has inflicted on mankind for centuries. Only 9,700 articles related to Ebola have been published since it was discovered in 1976. By September 2020, the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine received 30,000 nCoV-related articles – many 16,000 more than all of 2019. “All that difference is COVID-19,” said Eric Rubin, editor-in-chief of the New England Journal of Medicine. “This is an unprecedented shift in scientific priorities,” said Francis Collins, director of the US National Institutes of Health. In addition, online archives are readily available to provide research data and evidence before periodic scientific journals. Scientists identify and share dozens of viral genome sequences. More than 200 clinical trials have been launched, bringing together hospitals, laboratories and hundreds of thousands of volunteers globally. Speaking in The New York Times, Dr. Francesco Perrone, who leads a clinical trial of nCoV in Italy, said: “I have never heard genuine and excellent scientists talk about nationality. mine, your country. My language, your language. My geographic location, your geographic location. This is really far from true senior scientists. Photo: LG The New York Times revealed that one morning, University of Pittsburgh scientists discovered a weasel after exposure to COVID-19 particles developed a high fever. This is a potential step forward for vaccine testing in animals. Under normal circumstances, they would begin to review the research results with an article in an academic journal. But Professor Paul Duprex, the university’s lead virologist, shared the results with scientists around the world in just two hours, instead of spending months on an article. . A small measure of openness can be found on the servers of medRxiv and bioRxiv, two online archives that share academic data before it is published in journals. The archives are filled with thousands of coronavirus studies around the globe. Chinese researchers have contributed a considerable part to the nCoV research in this treasure. A Chinese lab announced the original virus genome in January, providing the basis for nCoV tests worldwide. Thanks to this initial genetic data, the world’s leading research institutions have based and supplemented the evidence, thereby successfully testing vaccine products with a preventive effect of up to 90% – 95%, in a time of unprecedented speed in history. By November, more than 197,000 nCoV genomes had been sequenced. Lauren Gardner, an engineering professor at Johns Hopkins University who has studied dengue and Zika, knows that the new diseases will come with a scarcity of real-time data. So she and her students created a global online map to count all COVID-19 cases and deaths. After one night’s work, they launched it on January 22. / 2020. Since then, the dashboard has been accessed daily by governments, public health agencies, the media and anxious global citizens. One of the foe-to-friend partnerships mentioned is a joint production cooperation agreement between US pharmaceutical firm J&J’s COVID-19 vaccine and leading rival Merck in March 2021. Emphasizing that the US is in a state of “national emergency” and it is time to act “drastically and boldly”, the two rivals have begun to speed up the production of vaccines, aiming to supply the country. 200 million doses in 2021, bringing America to community immunity. Photo: LG From Asia to Europe, Africa to the Americas, despite the differences in politics, culture, ethnicity, language … scientists share, cooperate, seek all vaccine solutions and remedy against viruses. Even though large, proprietary research may lead to sponsorship, promotion and reputation, scientists have left behind secret ways of working, hoarding data from competitors, to together find the light at the end of the tunnel to save all of humanity. These efforts have paid off. New diagnostic tests can detect the virus within minutes. Huge open datasets on the viral genome and cases of COVID-19 give the most detailed picture of the evolution of a disease that has never appeared in history. Along with the new discoveries revolving around, humankind is prepared with an abundance of scientific resources to be ready for the face of future pandemic. In particular, if no one dared to say anything for sure in March 2020, the positive results of a series of vaccines plus successful antiviral drug antibodies would have brought people to life. closer to the prospect of ending the pandemic. A series of countries launch a campaign to vaccinate hundreds of millions of people by 2021, with the aim of achieving the earliest community immunity, to bring the entire country back to normal as before. Borders will reopen, and laboratories and research facilities around the globe will revive again, and continue to seek solutions that will push humanity toward the future. That is the unchanging mission of science, in any historical moment.