Let's talk about Covid-19 - even if it does look like the wooly hat your Auntie Edith used to wear.
How did it all begin?
Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome -Coronavirus 2, or SARS-CoV-2 was the origin of the outbreak in 2019 and was thus named Covid-19, or C-19 for short.
SARS viridionIt is thought to have come from animals, possibly bats because they are one of the main
hosts of SARS-related viruses. This has been known for decades but the
jump from animals to humans is comparatively recent.
What do we know about
C-19?
The original virus mutated
to make itself more effective, it did this by improving the spike which
allows it entry into human cells.
C-19 does not have a
mind of its own; it has no evil intent but like everything else on earth, its
main concern is to replicate itself. To do this, it needed to be more efficient.
Imagine C-19 is a burglar - Charlie.
He inherits some tools of the trade from his old Dad who was a housebreaker some 30 years ago. He finds they are not quite up to the job because home security is better these days. So he has to change (mutate) to make entry more effective. He acquires new tools.
The virus has spikes, the things which make it look like a crown (thus ‘corona’ a crown) but in the original virus, they often broke. So it mutated into a form with better spikes.
Viruses mutate or evolve, to make themselves more effective, just as Darwin discovered most
things do.
Humans have an enzyme called ACE2, attached to the cell membranes in
the lungs, arteries, heart, kidney, and intestines. It also lowers blood pressure.
ACE2 is the entry point C-19 looks for, just as Charlie looks
for the weak spot in home security. Once
C-19 and ACE2 meet up - the door swings open - in our case, for infection to
enter.
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What’s being done to stop it?
We all know that to avoid infection, any infection, it’s better not to come into contact with it.
As this virus can be in the air and on surfaces, this isn’t easy. We may inadvertently touch something with C-19 germs on it - as is suspected in this latest New Zealand outbreak.
Or come round a corner or through a doorway,
oblivious to the fact someone sneezed or coughed into the air just before we did.
It’s little comfort to know that other illnesses kill more people each year, or that most patients recover from C-19. We don’t want it thank you very much.
Scientists all over the world are working on remedies,
sometimes vaccines, sometime giving transfusions of plasma and antibodies from
people who have recovered.
This latter seemed very promising until a 33 year old man in Hong Kong who had recovered, went to Spain - and was re-infected. His immunity had lasted just 3 months.
However, virologist will be able to tell if the virus strain he had at home is different from the one he acquired in Spain. If it’s a mutation, they have more ammunition against it.
A New Zealand scientist, Professor Peter Tyler, has created the compound which is now a front runner as a treatment option for Covid-19.
Prof. Tyler won the 2017 MacDiarmid Award for his work discovering new
drugs and this one, now called Galidesivir
is being trialled in Brazil.
The race is on but when one reporter asked a
scientist who would win - the USA, China, UK or NZ, he said. “There’s a huge
amount of collaboration. It’s not a race between all the developers; it’s
actually a race against the virus.”
Just as we’ve known all along - teamwork and doing our part,
however onerous it may be to stay at home day after week after month, it’s
already reduced the effectiveness of the viral infections and saved millions of
lives.
Keep that home scurity system turned on - Charlie’s still out there.
