1 Million Deaths from Coronavirus — 7 Experts Consider Important Questions

The pandemic has reached a tough milestone: 1 million people have died in COVID-19. World meter..

On January 13th, Queen’s University Belfast virologist Connor Bamford announced “The Outbreak of Mystery China Pneumonia May Caused by the New Human Coronavirus”. Since then, it has published more than 3,500 articles on the now so novel coronavirus, officially named SARS-CoV-2. Despite this enormous achievement from the world’s leading experts, we have only skimmed all the surfaces we have to know about this nasty pathogen. Many remain a mystery.

During this important time, we asked several experts in various disciplines what their burning question about the coronavirus was. This is what they said:

Connor Banford, Queen’s University Belfast Virology Researcher

How did SARS-CoV-2 invade the population?

To stop the next pandemic, as in the case of influenza, we need to understand how viruses like SARS-CoV-2 invade humans.Originally thought to have appeared on the South China Seafood Wholesale Market in December 2019, the first patient No link to the market It suggests that the virus appeared before that. Why did that happen?

Since the first survey on the onset of the SARS coronavirus in 2002, the Greater Horseshoe Bat in Southeast Asia has Reservoir host, And virus (RmYN02) Very similar to SARS-CoV-2 It has already been found in bats.However, similar viruses Found in scale armor, SARS-CoV-2 may not be jumping directly from the bat.

Also, SARS-CoV-2 is already available Cat, dog, Tigers And mink, And SARS-CoV-1 (the virus that caused the SARS outbreak 2002-04), captive raccoon dogs and raccoon dogs acted as intermediate hosts, bringing the bat virus closer to humans. SARS-CoV-2 is a generalist virus that can spread to a wide range of species.

Zoonotic diseases are becoming more and more threatening as humans come into contact with wildlife. We must be vigilant. An important step now is to understand the events that caused SARS-CoV-2 to transition from bats to humans.

Sarah Caddy, Clinical Researcher, Virus Immunology, University of Cambridge

How can I tell if someone is protected from SARS-CoV-2?

The immune response to SARS-CoV-2 infection is aimed at eliminating the virus from the body. Many studies have carefully described the various stages of the immune response after the initial infection, but it is unclear which aspects of immunity are essential to prevent repeated infections. What is the relative role of different types of antibodies, or the importance of different T cell subsets?

Therefore, an important goal of SARS-CoV-2 immunological research is to identify immune components that can indicate that a person is protected from future infections. Such markers are called “”.Correlation of protection“.

The ability to measure the exact correlation of protection is valuable for two reasons. First, you can find out if a person who has recovered from COVID-19 is likely to be re-infected. Second, identifying easily measurable defense correlations can help vaccine testing. It may speed up the assessment of vaccine efficacy.

However, identify the appropriate correlation of protection Other coronaviruses The more infamous it is, the harder it is. Previously, useful results were obtained only when volunteers were ly infected with the virus.the first Human SARS-Cov-2 Challenge Research It is expected that this will allow us to find protection correlations more quickly, as it is scheduled to begin early next year.

Derek Gatherer, Lecturer and Fellow, Institute for Social Future Studies, Lancaster University

How can you explain the extreme geographic variation in COVID-19 mortality?

Cumulative COVID deaths-19 people per million (dpm) are highly unevenly distributed throughout Europe, from 7dpm in Slovakia to 856dpm in Belgium (see map below). Wedges in relatively less affected countries extend south from Finland to the northern Balkans.

Other continents, especially Southeast Asian countries, have similar pockets with low COVID-19 mortality. Populations in low-mortality countries may have some degree of cross-immunity to SARS-CoV-2 produced by recent exposure to another coronavirus.

A hint that this may be the case is provided by the observation that antibodies from the original 2003 SARS patients have some binding to the coronavirus. 229E, NL63, especially OC43.. However, due to little attention paid to seasonal coronaviruses, in fact, seasonal non-influenza respiratory infections, relevant clinical data are generally very sparse and often outdated (eg, for example). One-third of Hamburg’s inhabitants had antibodies to the coronavirus OC43 in 1975 Or 58% of Hungarians sampled 5 years later).

More laboratory studies are urgently needed to understand how cross-immune coronaviruses affect each other. On the other hand, group studies Coronavirus Antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 as well as its mild but potentially important cousin.

Serology (a study of antibody prevalence) has long been a virological Cinderella compared to the more fascinating world of genomic sequencing, but its importance and the consequences of its negligence are becoming apparent. There is.

Ann Moore, Senior Lecture on Biochemistry and Cell Biology, University of Cork

What does short-term vs. long-term success look like for vaccines?

The end of the COVID-19 pandemic requires the identification and manufacture of safe and effective vaccines, followed by a global immunization campaign.

The candidate SARS-CoV-2 vaccine has been rapidly developed based on many years of vaccine development efforts. An unprecedented and significant investment in this pandemic vaccine effort can only spend a lot of time on the success or failure of the trial. The virus must be circulating within the community for the test to be successful. This allows you to determine how many people who have been vaccinated (compared to those who have been given a placebo) have been infected.

Short-term success is a safe vaccine Provide at least 50% protection.. And what does long-term success look like when you look at short-term success?

The biggest question is how long the protection period is. If it is short-lived, how do you bring your immunity back to protective levels? How do you understand this without resorting to traditional empirical approaches? In the absence of short-term success, how can we ensure that global efforts are maintained to prevent the SARS-CoV-2 vaccine from being in the same situation as the end of SARS vaccine efforts? Another pandemic will occur. Long-term vision and commitment are needed for short-term future success.

Susan Michie and Robert West, Professor of Health Psychology at UCL

How are COVID safe behaviors incorporated into people’s lives?

COVID-19 appears to be with us for the foreseeable future.We will all have to Take various actions To prevent yourself from being infected or infecting others. We know what these are: the question is how they can be embedded in our lives.

Actions include keeping a greater physical distance from others. Carry a COVID kit (face mask, hand sanitizer, tissue) whenever you are outside the house.wearing mask Properly store or safely dispose of in indoor public areas. Disinfect hands and surface if there is a possibility of contamination. Cough and sneeze tissue. Do not touch your eyes, nose or mouth unless you know your hands are clean. Avoid or leave dangerous situations, such as crowded indoors with poor ventilation. Get vaccinated; stay home and be tested for symptoms.

The challenge is how to adopt them on a large scale and maintain them for a long time, that is, how to incorporate them into people’s lives as daily life and habits. To do this, we need to understand what sustains and changes human behavior. We take advantage of these opportunities to equip people with the skills to develop routines that can become habits over time, provide time and social and environmental support to achieve this. You need to be motivated.

David Hunter, Professor Richard Doll of Epidemiology and Medicine, University of Oxford

What is the full range of health effects of COVID-19 infection?

There are currently excellent data on deaths from COVID-19 infection, showing that the risk of death increases surprisingly with age. This is in contrast to the 2009 H1N1 influenza epidemic, which had relatively little impact on the elderly, and reminds us that we have much more to learn about the virus.

Although most focus has been on death, small studies of COVID-19 survivors discharged from hospitals suggest that many do not return to baseline health. Despite many individual reports of fever, malaise, and recurrent attacks of fever, little is known about the “long COVID” among those who did not require hospitalization. Various other symptoms..

Follow-up of COVID-19 patients suggests evidence of damage to the heart, lungs, and other organs that may cause future problems, which may be true even among patients with mild symptoms. There is some evidence that. Many viral infections can cause undiagnosed medical conditions, but serious long-term effects are relatively rare. However, if these effects are more common in COVID-19, devoting to death means not considering the full cost of failure to control the epidemic, nor the full benefits of doing so. I will.

Studies have begun on post-discharge patients. Well-controlled research is urgently needed among the majority of infected individuals who did not require hospitalization in case only the tip of the COVID iceberg is seen.

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