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A year ago, I wrote an article for The Conversation about a mysterious pneumonia outbreak in the Chinese city of Wuhan, which turned out to be the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.
At the time of writing, very little was known about the disease and the virus that caused it, but I cautioned against concerns over emerging coronaviruses, citing SARS, MERS and others as important examples.
Since then – and every day since – we have continued to learn a lot about SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19, finding new ways to control the pandemic and no doubt keep us safer in the decades to come.
Here’s what we’ve learned since last January and what we still need to learn.
Lessons learned
Initially, the disease we now call COVID-19 was described in terms of lung inflammation, or pneumonia, in the elderly. But we now know that infection with SARS-CoV-2 can cause a wide range of symptoms in people of all ages, from no symptoms to systemic inflammation and death.
And then there are the lingering symptoms that many suffer from – the so-called “long COVID”. We are also starting to distinguish between the different phases of the disease, damage to organs (like the heart and brain), and the role of co-infections with bacteria and fungi.
As of January 2020, there was limited evidence of human-to-human transmission. If so, it was thought to be similar to its cousin SARS-CoV-1 virus, which causes SARS, in that the infection spreads relatively late in the disease, when symptoms are at their peak. .
Still, early studies showed that the spread between people was very effective for SARS-CoV-2, and that it could happen quickly and before the worst symptoms started. This made control difficult without sensitive and specific tests using the now famous PCR test.
Social distancing, hygiene and masks would help limit the spread alongside isolation and quarantine.
In the beginning, there were no treatments or vaccines for COVID-19 other than support in the hospital, such as providing oxygen when patients had difficulty breathing or antibiotics when they were get a secondary bacterial infection.
In the months following January, researchers quickly tested new therapies against COVID-19, identifying dexamethasone, and developed many safe and highly effective COVID-19 vaccines that are now in use.
Future questions
While we learn about COVID-19 daily, several important scientific questions remain that will shape the future of SARS-CoV-2 and humanity for decades to come. The first is how SARS-CoV-2 will evolve, adapt and change over the next year in the face of natural or acquired immunity through vaccination?
A second, less academic point would be whether this is important. Our treatments and public health measures will always work, but what about our vaccines?
We continue to monitor, predict and understand the course of SARS-CoV-2 with respect to vaccine “ escape ”, and all of our available evidence suggests that it is minimal at best and that our platforms Current vaccines are robust enough to withstand any change if necessary.
We must also remain alert to the risk of SARS-CoV-2 establishing itself in another species, such as mink.
Then there is the question of how SARS-CoV-2 will interact with other viruses circulating in humans. The human respiratory tract is home to several viruses that circulate together – often in a single person.
These viruses promote or prevent the infection of other viruses. We now know that through social distancing, the spread of most of our respiratory viruses, such as influenza and RSV, has been severely limited.
How will they “react” when mitigation measures, such as social distancing, end?
Finally, we need to identify the origin of SARS-CoV-2 to prevent the continued spillover of SARS-CoV-2-like (or indeed other pathogenic coronaviruses) in humans.
We know that SARS-CoV-2 probably appeared in Southeast Asia recently, and that ultimately the virus was in a horseshoe bat. But the biological and ecological steps it took to reach humans remain obscure.
Solving this puzzle will help protect our health for decades to come, much like what has been done with swine and bird flu infections.
As I said in my article a year ago, these outbreaks “are a constant reminder of the need to invest in research into the biology and evolution of emerging viruses, and ultimately to identify safe drugs. and effective in treating – or vaccines to prevent – serious diseases “.
The COVID-19 pandemic has demonstrated that science and scientists can and will deliver results, with the right financial and societal support. How then will we apply the lessons of COVID-19 to other serious issues, such as emerging infections, antimicrobial resistance and climate change?
Connor Bamford, Researcher, Virology, Queen’s University Belfast.
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
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