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Anthony S. Fauci has agreed to testify in front of the House panel investigating the nations coronavirus response, the first time the prominent infectious-disease expert will publicly face Congress since leaving government nearly 1 years ago.
Fauci, who helped steer the Trump and Biden administrations efforts to fight the virus, is scheduled to testify June 3 in front of the House Oversight select subcommittee on the coronavirus pandemic, with lawmakers expected to press him on the still-unknown origins of the pandemic, the governments vaccine mandates and other issues that remain politically divisive, more than four years after the outbreak began.
The GOP-led panel includes some of Faucis most persistent critics in Congress, such as Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) and Ronny Jackson (R-Tex.), who have repeatedly alleged that the pandemic began with an accident at a lab in China funded by Faucis agency and covered up by U.S. officials.
Retirement from public service does not excuse Dr. Fauci from accountability to the American people, Rep. Brad Wenstrup (R-Ohio), who chairs the panel, said in a statement. On June 3, Americans will have an opportunity to hear directly from Dr. Fauci about his role in overseeing our nations pandemic response, shaping pandemic-era policies, and promoting singular questionable narratives about the origins of COVID-19.
Fauci has denied wrongdoing, and public health leaders have praised his work and said Republicans have unfairly targeted him.
Debate about the origins of the SARS-CoV-2 virus remains, with evolutionary biologists and virologists saying the outbreak probably began because of a spillover from infected animals, but some scientists suggesting a leak from a lab was the likely source. A declassified government intelligence report released last year said U.S. intelligence officials were unaware of a lab leak that could have caused the pandemic, adding that officials had no evidence that the Wuhan Institute of Virology, the Chinese laboratory where researchers were studying coronaviruses, had SARS-CoV-2 or a close progenitor in its possession before the outbreak.
The select subcommittee has not uncovered any evidence that directly implicates Dr. Fauci and [former National Institutes of Health director Francis] Collins in a coverup of the pandemics origin or collusion with scientific journals to suppress the lab-leak hypothesis, Rep. Raul Ruiz (Calif.), the panels top Democrat, said at a hearing last week.
The 83-year-old Fauci led the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases for nearly 40 years, where he forged relationships with prominent politicians, such as then-President George W. Bush, and helped shape the nations response to HIV/AIDS, Ebola and other infectious diseases.
The longtime government official quickly became a household name in the early days of the coronavirus pandemic, routinely appearing at White House briefings where he urged Americans to wear masks, get vaccinated and take other precautions. Many Americans said they were reassured by his briefings particularly in contrast to then-President Donald Trumps freewheeling medical advice, such as endorsing anti-malaria drugs to fight covid. President Biden named Fauci his chief medical adviser, and the Biden administration relied on him as a key spokesman during its vaccine rollout in 2021.
But public confidence in Fauci and other health officials deteriorated amid frustrations about pandemic-era policies such as remote schooling and attacks from GOP lawmakers. Fifty-three percent of Americans in April 2022 said they trusted Faucis recommendations on coronavirus vaccines, down from 68 percent in December 2020, according to polling by KFF, a nonpartisan health research organization. The dip was driven by growing Republican skepticism; just 25 percent of Republicans said they trusted Faucis coronavirus vaccine recommendations in April 2022, down from 47 percent in December 2020, while Democrats trust in Fauci remained largely unchanged.
After leaving government in December 2022, Fauci joined the Georgetown University faculty as a distinguished professor and wrote a memoir set to publish in June.
Fauci privately testified in front of House lawmakers in January, answering questions about his role in the nations coronavirus response, whether scientists should experiment with risky viruses in their labs and how his agency funded research abroad. Attendees offered starkly different representations of the closed-door hearings, with Republicans saying Fauci dodged direct questions and changed his answers on lab leak-related issues, while Democrats countered that Fauci was helpful and the GOP-led questions broke little ground.
The Republicans have totally distorted Dr. Faucis testimony, Rep. Kathy Castor (D-Fla.) said after the first day of closed-door hearings, adding that she hoped Faucis private comments would be quickly made publicly available. The transcript has not yet been published.
Although Fauci has been out of government since late 2022, and many Americans focus on the pandemic has dwindled as the virus has receded, he continues to be routinely invoked by Republicans as a political symbol. The coronavirus panels GOP lawmakers and their witnesses maintain that the longtime government official exerted too much control over the nations pandemic response and should have been regarded with more skepticism.
The media parroted whatever Fauci and the CDC fed them, Marty Makary, a Johns Hopkins transplant surgeon and Fox News analyst, said at a hearing last year.
Other notable figures are set to soon face the House panel, including Peter Daszak, president of the New York-based research organization EcoHealth Alliance, who is scheduled to testify next week. EcoHealth has defended its research with the Wuhan Institute of Virology and denied any connection between that work and the emergence of SARS-CoV-2.
correction
An earlier version of this article incorrectly said that Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene represents Louisiana in the House. She represents Georgia. The article also misstated the year when Anthony S. Fauci privately testified before House lawmakers. He testified in January 2024. The article has been corrected.
By VCU News staff
Jeanine Guidry, Ph.D., an affiliate faculty member at the Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences in theSchool of Population Healthand at theRichard T. Robertson School of Media and Culturein theCollege of Humanities and Sciencesat Virginia Commonwealth University, is the recipient of the APIC/AJIC Award for Publication Excellence for her study Willingness to Get the COVID Vaccine With and Without Emergency Use Approval.
The award recognizes an author who has published an article in the American Journal of Infection Control which was widely read and cited during the previous year.
Guidry's study, conducted at VCU with colleaguesLinnea Laestadius, Ph.D.;Emily Vraga, Ph.D.;Carrie Miller, Ph.D.;Paul Perrin, Ph.D.;Candace Burton, Ph.D.;Mark Ryan, M.D.;Bernard Fuemmeler, Ph.D.; andKellie Carlyle, Ph.D., involved a July 2020 survey of 788 adults that found that 59.9% of respondents were definitely or probably planning to receive a future coronavirus vaccine, but fewer than half of respondents planned to get it under emergency use authorization. It also found that white people were more likely than Black people to be vaccinated.
With the ongoing presence of COVID-19 in our society, the risk of long COVID and the long-term threat of vaccine hesitancy, continuing to improve our understanding of why people may or may not vaccinate is of great importance, said Guidry, who is now a faculty member atTilburg Universityin the Netherlands.My co-authors and I are grateful for APIC/AJICs support and commitment to deeper understanding in this field.
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Shortly after winning a stay on a COVID-19 vaccine patent lawsuit brought by Moderna, Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech are being dragged into another round of mRNA litigation by GSK.
GSK on Thursday filed a lawsuit in Delaware federal court accusing Pfizer and BioNTech of infringing five patents related to the mRNA technology behind the partners COVID shot Comirnaty. The relevant mRNA research was conducted more than a decade before the COVID-19 pandemic and was picked up by GSK in 2015 when the company acquired a substantial portion of Novartis global vaccine business, according to the lawsuit.
GSK claims Pfizer and BioNTech subsequently reaped billions of dollars in revenue from infringing GSKs Patents-in-Suit and continue to benefit, without ever obtaining a license.
Now, the British drugmaker is seeking a reasonable royalty from Pfizer and BioNTech, as well as a compulsory ongoing licensing fee for the partners alleged use of GSKs patented mRNA technology.
A GSK spokesperson confirmed over email that the company filed suit and said its committed to taking appropriate action where necessary to protect the companys intellectual property. She described the GSK patents in question as foundational to Pfizer and BioNTechs mRNA vaccines.
GSK would be willing to license these patents on commercially reasonable grounds to make sure patients continue to enjoy access to Pfizer and BioNTechs shots, the spokesperson added.
Pfizer, for its part, remains confident in its intellectual property (IP) position and intends to vigorously defend against [GSKs] claims, a company spokesperson said in a statement.
The latest lawsuit in Delaware marks the opening of a new front in GSKs vaccine patent litigation against Pfizer.
Last August, GSK claimed in a separate court filing that Pfizers respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) shot Abrysvo violated four patents related to its own RSV immunization Arexvy. GSK argued that Pfizer began the project that led to Abrysvo no earlier than 2013at least seven years after GSK kickstarted its own RSV program.
Separately, Pfizer and BioNTech have been locking horns with Moderna over mRNA IP for nearly two years.
The kerfuffle started in late August of 2022 when Moderna filed lawsuits in the United States and Germany contending that Pfizer and BioNTech copied key features of its patented mRNA technology. Pfizer and BioNTech filed a countersuit and demanded a jury trial in December of that same year, with lawyers for the partners arguing that Moderna was attempting to put itself in the single, starring role of the response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
More recently, Pfizer and BioNTech last summer pressed the U.S. Patent and Trademark Offices (PTOs) Patent Trial and Appeals Board to invalidate a pair of Moderna patents around mRNA vaccine production.
Earlier this month, Massachusetts federal judge Richard G. Stearns granted a stay on the case to provide more time for the Patent Trial and Appeal Board to review Pfizer and BioNTechs patent challenges.
COVID-19 vaccine revenues have fallen precipitously for both Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna over the last two years.
In 2023, Comirnaty broughtin $11.2 billion in sales, a steep 70% decline from the $37.8 billion generated by the shot in 2022.
Credit: Nishant Das/Pexels
A new cohort study provided insight into the association between COVID-19 vaccination and uveitis, supporting an elevated risk after the immunization, with both vaccine type and post-vaccination period mediating the risk.1
The cumulative incidence of uveitis was 8.6% and 16.8% during the 3-month and 1-year periods, respectively, indicating more than half of the uveitis incidences occurred shortly after vaccination. All 4 vaccine types were correlated with increased risk after the first dose.
These results emphasize the importance of vigilance and monitoring for uveitis in the context of vaccinations, including COVID-19 vaccinations, particularly in individuals with a history of uveitis, wrote the investigative team, led by Seong Joon Ahn, MD, PhD, department of ophthalmology, Hanyang University Seoul Hospital.
Given the scope of the COVID-19 pandemic, COVID-19 vaccines represented a breakthrough in efforts to combat the ongoing disease.2 Vaccines, including recombinant messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccine, adenovirus vector-based vaccine, and inactivated vaccine, received emergency use authorization from global regulatory agencies. An ongoing conversation surrounding vaccine safety led to heightened attention on short-term and long-term adverse events related to widespread vaccine use.
While rare, numerous ocular adverse events have been reported after vaccination, including uveitis and retinal vascular occlusion, although a causal link was not established.3 Among those with a history of uveitis, it is crucial to understand the risk of COVID-19 vaccination on uveitis, particularly its effect on the recurrence of the disease.
Ahn and colleagues noted the timing of vaccine administration and postvaccination is important for a comprehensive understanding of the temporal association between COVID-19 vaccination and uveitis.1 The team assessed the Korean National Health Insurance Service (NHIS) and Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) databases, including data on approximately 500,000 individuals with a history of uveitis and their vaccination details.
The retrospective, population-based cohort study included individuals with uveitis, diagnosed between January 2015 and February 2021 in South Korea. After the exclusion of those without COVID-19 vaccination or with SARS-CoV-2 infection, the analysis included individuals with a history of uveitis had received 1 dose of a mRNA (BNT162b2 [Pfizer-BioNTech] or mRNA-1273 [Moderna]) or adenovirus vector-based (ChAdOx1 [AstraZeneca] or Ad26.COV2.S [Janssen]) COVID-19 vaccine.
A diagnosis of uveitis was categorized by onset (early, within 30 days, or delayed) and type (anterior or nonanterior). Overall, the study population included 473,934 individuals (mean age, 58.9 years; 51.3% female) with documented COVID-19 vaccination
Upon analysis, the cumulative incidence of postvaccination uveitis was 8.6% at 3 months, 12.5% at 6 months, and 16.9% at 1 year, with most individuals experiencing anterior uveitis type. Overall, Ahn and colleagues identified an increased risk of uveitis in the postvaccination period (hazard ratio [HR], 1.21; 95% CI, 1.19 - 1.24).
An investigation into early- and delayed-onset postvaccination uveitis demonstrated a higher risk in the early-onset period (HR, 1.64; 95% CI, 1.53 - 1.76), but the risk was maintained in the delayed-onset period (HR, 1.18; 95% CI, 1.15 - 1.21), compared with prevaccination periods.
Specifically, those who received the BNT162b2 (HR, 1.68; 95% CI, 1.52 - 1.86), mRNA-1273 (HR, 1.51; 95% CI, 1.21 - 1.89), ChAdOx1 (HR, 1.60; 95% CI, 1.43 - 1.79), and Ad26.COV2.S (HR, 2.07; 95% CI, 1.40 - 3.07) vaccines experienced the highest uveitis risk in the early-onset postvaccination period.
In a linked editorial, Nisha R. Acharya, MD, MS, F.I. Proctor Foundation, University of California, San Francisco, noted these findings add to the evidence on potential risks of ocular inflammation stemming from COVID-19 vaccination and prove the utility of population-based retrospective study designs in evaluating vaccine-associated events.4
However, Acharya also pointed to the inherent limitations of the study design, including reliance on diagnostic coding for a uveitis outcome, not accounting for the healthy vaccinee bias, and a lack of contextualization on the greater risks of being unvaccinated for COVID-19.
As long as investigators account for the inherent limitations associated with these methodologies and appropriately interpret findings in the context of comprehensive risk discussions, these studies are foundational in helping to guide clinical decisions relating to postvaccine monitoring, counseling, and risk mitigation, Acharya wrote.
References
Geneva (Precision Vaccinations News)
As of April 2024, the World Health Organization (WHO) has determinedthat nearly all circulating SARS-CoV-2variants reported in publicly available databases are JN.1 derived coronavirus variants.
On April 26, 2024, the WHO stated in a media release thatvirus evolution is expected to continue from JN.1, and future formulations of COVID-19 vaccines should aim to induce enhanced neutralizing antibody responses to JN.1 and its descendent lineages.
The WHO says the regular review of the available vaccine effectiveness evidence (VE) is critical to assessing future versions.
Given the neutralizing antibody responses to early JN.1 descendent lineage and the evidence from early Relative VEstudies against JN.1, the continued use of the current monovalent XBB. 1.5 formulation will offer people protection.
Furthermore, byWHO SAGE policy, vaccination programs should continue to use any WHO emergency-use listed or prequalified COVID-19 vaccines, and vaccination should not be delayed in anticipation of access to vaccines with an updated composition.
This is essential news since recent research sayspeople seek COVID-19 vaccine options in 2024.
In the United States, the WHO and the U.S. FDA have authorized Novavax Inc.'s protein-based COVID-19 vaccine.
NuvaxovidXBB.1.5 protein-basedvaccine is currently usedglobally in individuals 12 and older who have previously been vaccinated with a COVID-19 vaccine and have not already been vaccinated with a recently updated mRNA COVID-19 vaccine.
John C. Jacobs, President and Chief Executive Officer of Novavax Inc., shared his perspective with Precision Vaccination News. "Novavax has been developing and manufacturing a monovalent protein-based JN.1 COVID-19 vaccine at-risk to ensure readiness for this fall."
"Today's recommendation by the WHO Technical Advisory Group on COVID-19 Vaccine Composition is an important step to help ensure access to a non-mRNA protein-based vaccine option for those at highest risk globally."
Novavax's vaccinesintegratethe company's proprietary nanoparticle technology,Matrix-M, anadjuvantto enhance immune responses and stimulate high levels ofneutralizingantibodies.
As of April 2024, Novavax vaccines are generally available at pharmacies in the U.S.
The U.S. FDA previously announced that the Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committeewill hold a public discussion on May 16, 2024, to recommend the selectedstrain(s) to be included in the 2024-2025 formula for COVID-19 vaccines.
Politics
By Victor Nava
Published April 27, 2024, 1:06 a.m. ET
Disgraced former New York Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo has agreed to appear before a panel of House lawmakers and discuss his administrations controversial handling of the COVID-19 pandemic in New York nursing homes, the chairman of the committee said Friday.
Governor Cuomo will be appearing before our select Subcommittee on the Pandemic on June 11, Rep. Brad Wenstrup (R-Ohio) told CNN host Jake Tapper.
This will be a transcribed interview at 10 a.m., Wenstrup added, indicating that his testimony will take place behind closed doors.
Cuomos agreement to testify comes more than a month after the Republican-led House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic issued a subpoena for his testimony.
The three-term Democrat resigned in 2021 amid a wave of scandals, including the alleged cover-up of COVID-19 deaths in New York nursing homes.
The ex-gov denies that his administrations March 2020 policy requiring nursing homes to accept COVID-19-positive patients led to additional deaths.
Nearly two years later, New Yorks comptroller found that Cuomo had misled the public in undercounting such deaths by more than 50%.
Cuomos order potentially caused 1,000 additional nursing home deaths, according to an analysis by The Empire Center.
Im trying to learn why he would do something like this, Wenstrup told Tapper. As a doctor who has treated infections, it goes against all medical common sense to take someone who was highly contagious and put them amongst the most vulnerable.
Wenstrup noted that his committee first reached out to Cuomo about nine months ago, but the former governor ignored on many of our requests.
A spokesman for the former governor disputed Wenstrupts claim.
Theres no news here, we agreed to do this months ago, Cuomo rep Rich Azzopardi said in a statement.
This is pure politics and simple fact remains that this issue has been reviewed three times by the Department of Justice under Trump and Biden, as well as Congress and the Manhattan District Attorney who found no there there, he added. Any real review would focus on the 10 other states with similar policies, red and blue alike.
The House panel also announced this week that Dr. Anthony Fauci has agreed to testify on the origins and government response to the pandemic.
His testimony is slated for June 3.
https://nypost.com/2024/04/27/us-news/disgraced-ex-ny-gov-andrew-cuomo-agrees-to-testify-before-house-covid-19-panel/?utm_source=url_sitebuttons&utm_medium=site%20buttons&utm_campaign=site%20buttons
In a recent study published in The Lancet Infectious Diseases, researchers evaluate the persistence of the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) in tissues and its association with long coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) symptoms.
Study:The persistence of SARS-CoV-2 in tissues and its association with long COVID symptoms: a cross-sectional cohort study in China. Image Credit: Kateryna Kon / Shutterstock.com
Postmortem examinations of patients who have died due to COVID-19 have revealed the presence of SARS-CoV-2 in several organs, thus suggesting that this viral infection may lead to certain systemic diseases. Likewise, residual viral protein and nucleic acids have been identified in different sample types, even after recovering from COVID-19.
Between 6-68% of individuals who have recovered from COVID-19 experience persistent symptoms, including headache, fatigue, dyspnea, diarrhea, or loss of taste/smell, a condition known as long COVID. Previous studies have suggested that some long COVID symptoms may be associated with SARS-CoV-2 persistence in tissues. However, there remains a lack of large-scale studies examining viral persistence in tissues at different time points after COVID-19 recovery.
The present study examines SARS-CoV-2 persistence in tissues after COVID-19 recovery and its association with long COVID symptoms. Patients diagnosed with mild COVID-19 in December 2022 who were scheduled for chemotherapy, immunotherapy, and gastroscopy or hospitalized for other reasons at one, two, or four months following infection were included in the analysis. Samples from 13 tissues were collected at these time points.
RNA was extracted from samples, and digital droplet polymerase chain reaction (ddPCR) was performed with nucleoprotein (N1) and open reading frame 1ab (ORF1ab) primers. A quantitative reverse-transcription polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR) assay was also performed to measure the levels of transmembrane serine protease 2 (TMPRSS2) and angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) in tumor/para-tumor samples and compare its sensitivity with dddPCR.
Immunohistochemistry, immunofluorescence, and RNA in situ hybridization assays were performed to validate ddPCR accuracy. Transcriptome sequencing of lung and vascular tissues was also performed to examine the effects of viral presence on host gene transcription. A multivariate logistic regression analysis explored the associations between SARS-CoV-2 persistence and long COVID symptoms.
Of the 238 enrolled patients, 225 were eligible for sample collection, 213 of whom completed the questionnaire at four months. A total of 72 patients reported experiencing at least one symptom four months following recovery from COVID-19. The average age of these patients was 52.3, whereas those without symptoms had an average age of 55.
Most patients were vaccinated with three doses before being diagnosed with COVID-19. Overall, 317 tissue specimens were obtained, 53, 198, and 66 of which were collected one, two, and four months after recovering from COVID-19, respectively. No association between viral presence in throat swabs and gastric mucosa was observed, thus implying no contamination from oral/nasal sampling during gastroscopy.
The proportion of tissues that tested positive for viral RNA on ddPCR declined over time. Comparatively, viral subgenomic RNA was detected in 8%, 15%, and 2% of solid tissue samples at one, two, and four months, respectively.
N1 and ORF1ab RNA were found in the thyroid, skin, lung, breast, brain, liver, intestine, stomach, blood vessels, and kidney tissues. Subgenomic RNA was also identified in 44% of samples positive for ORF1ab or N1.
The viral RNA detection rate was not significantly different between tumor and para-tumor tissues. Furthermore, there were no significant differences in transcript levels of ACE2 and TMPRSS2 between these tissues.
Seventy-four tissue samples were subject to qRT-PCR; only one with the highest copy number on ddPCR tested positive for SARS-CoV-2. Viral sequencing classified the variant as BA.5.2, the dominant circulating strain when the study was conducted.
Moreover, ddPCR was found to be about 100 times more sensitive than qRT-PCR with the N1 primer. DdPCR is also more sensitive and reliable than immunohistochemistry, immunofluorescence, and RNA in situ hybridization.
Long COVID-19 symptoms at four months included fatigue, palpitations, chest pain, sleeping difficulties, dyspnea, diarrhea, nausea, joint pain, abdominal pain, myalgia, dizziness, and reduced appetite, among others. Viral persistence at any time after recovering from infection was significantly associated with these symptoms.
Transcriptome sequencing was performed on 24 lung and 11 blood vessel specimens. In lung specimens, innate/adaptive immunity and zinc finger protein-related genes were downregulated. In contrast, genes involved in cholesterol metabolism and the complement and coagulation pathways were downregulated in blood vessel samples.
The persistence of SARS-CoV-2 RNA in tissues from multiple organs was observed at several time points following COVID-19 recovery. Nevertheless, viral detection was markedly lower at four months, thus suggesting a slow but adequate viral clearance.
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The COVID-19 pandemic focused attention on viral respiratory infections and how they can be prevented and treated.
With effective vaccines against SARS-CoV-2 the virus that causes COVID-19 severe disease is less common than it was at the start of the pandemic, but there are still few effective treatments for this and other viral respiratory infections.
Currently, doctors use antivirals to try and prevent progression of these infections, with monoclonal antibodies and convalescent plasma for combating severe disease.
Now, a study led by researchers from Yale has found that a cheap, widely available antibiotic might reduce the risk of severe disease from viral respiratory infections.
The study found that neomycin, applied inside the nose, caused a strong immune response in mice and hamsters which protected against infection with both SARS-CoV-2 and influenza A.
And a small group of healthy people treated with a common nasal ointment containing neomycin Neosporin showed a similar immune response.
The study is published in PNAS.
William Schaffner, MD, professor of preventive medicine in the Department of Health Policy, and professor of medicine in the Division of Infectious Diseases at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, Nashville, TN, not involved in the study, commented on the findings for Medical News Today:
This is a very provocative study. Clearly, there is an urgent need for better ways both to prevent and to treat serious respiratory infections. This series of early studies suggests that non-specific immune stimulation by an over-the-counter antibiotic ointment could protect the mucus membranes of the nose from viral infection. This is a fascinating counter-intuitive concept that is worth pursuing further.
Antibiotics are drugs that kill bacteria and/or prevent them from multiplying. They are used to treat bacterial infections inside the body and also as topical treatments for infections of the skin.
Neomycin is an aminoglycoside antibiotic. People take it orally for infections in the digestive tract, or can use it as a topical ointment, neosporin.
Neosporin ointment, which contains neomycin and two other antibiotics, is used to prevent infection in minor cuts and burns, for bacterial infections of the nose, and for management of nosebleeds.
The researchers in this study investigated whether intranasal application of neomycin evoked antiviral protection against SARS-CoV-2 and influenza A in the upper respiratory tract of mice and whether it prevented transmission of SARS-CoV-2 in hamsters.
Jonathan Stoye, PhD, virologist and principal group leader at the Francis Crick Institute in London, United Kingdom, not involved in this research, explained to MNT:
The concept of preventing virus infection by stimulating natural antiviral immunity has enormous appeal.
First, the researchers treated mice with a single dose of 2 milligrams (mg) neomycin sulfate as 10 microliters (L) of neomycin solution per nostril. They euthanized mice on days 1, 3, 5, and 7 after neomycin treatment and collected nasal tissue for analysis.
From day 1, the neomycin-treated mice had significantly increased levels of interferon-stimulated gene (ISG) expression an immune response that is effective against viruses compared with controls.
The researchers then infected neomycin-treated transgenic (genetically engineered) mice with different strains of SARS-CoV-2.
The mice did not show the usual signs of infection, such as weight loss, and most survived the infection, whereas the control mice did not. Nasal cells from the neomycin-treated mice showed significantly lower levels of viral replication than those of control mice.
Neomycin-treated mice had a similar increase in resistance to influenza A infection.
The researchers treated Syrian hamsters with intranasal neomycin (5 mg) then housed them with hamsters that had been infected 24 hours earlier with SARS-CoV-2. One day later, only half of the neomycin-treated hamsters had any signs of infection.
This early-stage research in several rodent models identifies one compound, neomycin, that appears to have [antiviral] activity, Stoye told MNT.
However, Schaffner cautioned that findings in rodents might not be applicable to people. It is a long jump from animal studies to use in humans. This study represents the first steps in a long journey, he said.
The researchers then conducted a small, double-blind pilot study in people. A group of 12 healthy volunteers was treated with Neosporin ointment, which contains neomycin sulfate, bacitracin, and polymyxin B as its active ingredients.
They applied the ointment inside their nostrils using a cotton swab twice a day. Control volunteers applied petroleum jelly (Vaseline) in the same way.
When their immune responses were tested on days 4, 8 and 12 of the trial, the Neosporin-treated group had a much higher ISG response rate than the controls.
Although an immune response in human volunteers was elicited by the intranasal application of Neosporin ointment, whether this would prevent or treat viral infections in people will have to be demonstrated in a prospective, double-blind trial in a large group of volunteers, cautioned Schaffner.
Early results always are exciting, but much more work is needed before we can consider this for clinical application, Schaffner noted.
Using antivirals to treat infections can drive the development of resistant strains as respiratory viruses mutate rapidly, so the researchers suggest that stimulating the innate immune response using antibiotics could be an effective alternative treatment.
The researchers also point out that neomycin is cheap, readily available, and easy to administer intranasally.
However, both Schaffner and Stoye had concerns about using neomycin in this way.
Schaffner told us:
In order to prevent SARS-CoV-2 or any respiratory viral infection, patients likely would have to apply the Neosporin ointment to the nose for very long periods of time. Whether persons would be compliant with such a regimen would have to be determined. Also, the safety of such prolonged application of the ointment to the nasal mucus membranes would have to be established.
He also highlighted the risks of using any antibiotic for prolonged periods: In addition, there is the concern that the widespread and prolonged use of the antibiotic ointment could provoke the development of antibiotic resistance of the usual bacterial population of the nose and throat. If so, this would be a notable limitation.
While welcoming the study, Stoye called for further research into the treatment. Much more work will be required to determine how it works, whether it is protective in humans and whether it would be safe to use on the population level, he noted.
BEIJING (AP) The hunt for the origins of COVID-19 has gone dark in China, the victim of political infighting after a series of stalled and thwarted attempts to find the source of the virus that killed millions and paralyzed the world for months.
The Chinese government froze meaningful domestic and international efforts to trace the virus from the first weeks of the outbreak, despite statements supporting open scientific inquiry, an Associated Press investigation found. That pattern continues to this day, with labs closed, collaborations shattered, foreign scientists forced out and Chinese researchers barred from leaving the country.
The investigation drew on thousands of pages of undisclosed emails and documents and dozens of interviews that showed the freeze began far earlier than previously known and involved political and scientific infighting in China as much as international finger-pointing.
As early as Jan. 6, 2020, health officials in Beijing closed the lab of a Chinese scientist who sequenced the virus and barred researchers from working with him.
Scientists warn the willful blindness over coronavirus origins leaves the world vulnerable to another outbreak, potentially undermining pandemic treaty talks coordinated by the World Health Organization set to culminate in May.
At the heart of the question is whether the virus jumped from an animal or came from a laboratory accident. A U.S. intelligence analysis says there is insufficient evidence to prove either theory, but the debate has further tainted relations between the U.S. and China.
Unlike in the U.S., there is virtually no public debate in China about whether the virus came from nature or from a lab leak. In fact, there is little public discussion at all about the source of the disease, first detected in the central city of Wuhan.
Crucial initial efforts were hampered by bureaucrats in Wuhan trying to avoid blame who misled the central government; the central government, which muzzled Chinese scientists and subjected visiting WHO officials to stage-managed tours; and the U.N. health agency itself, which may have compromised early opportunities to gather critical information in hopes that by placating China, scientists could gain more access, according to internal materials obtained by AP.
In a faxed statement, Chinas Foreign Ministry defended Chinas handling of research into the origins, saying the country is open and transparent, shared data and research, and made the greatest contribution to global origins research. The National Health Commission, Chinas top medical authority, said the country invested huge manpower, material and financial resources and has not stopped looking for the origins of the coronavirus.
It could have played out differently, as shown by the outbreak of SARS, a genetic relative of COVID-19, nearly 20 years ago. China initially hid infections then, but WHO complained swiftly and publicly. Ultimately, Beijing fired officials and made reforms. The U.N. agency soon found SARS likely jumped to humans from civet cats in southern China and international scientists later collaborated with their Chinese counterparts to pin down bats as SARS natural reservoir.
But different leaders of both China and WHO, Chinas quest for control of its researchers, and global tensions have all led to silence when it comes to searching for COVID-19s origins. Governments in Asia are pressuring scientists not to look for the virus for fear it could be traced inside their borders.
Even without those complications, experts say identifying how outbreaks begin is incredibly challenging and that its rare to know with certainty how some viruses begin spreading.
Its disturbing how quickly the search for the origins of (COVID-19) escalated into politics, said Mark Woolhouse, a University of Edinburgh outbreak expert. Now this question may never be definitively answered.
A security person moves journalists away from the Wuhan Institute of Virology after a World Health Organization team arrived for a field visit in Wuhan in Chinas Hubei province on Feb. 3, 2021. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan, File)
Secrecy clouds the beginning of the outbreak. Even the date when Chinese authorities first started searching for the origins is unclear.
The first publicly known search for the virus took place on Dec. 31, 2019, when Chinese Center for Disease Control scientists visited the Wuhan market where many early COVID-19 cases surfaced.
However, WHO officials heard of an earlier inspection of the market on Dec. 25, 2019, according to a recording of a confidential WHO meeting provided to AP by an attendee. Such a probe has never been mentioned publicly by either Chinese authorities or WHO.
In the recording, WHOs top animal virus expert, Peter Ben Embarek, mentioned the earlier date, describing it as an interesting detail. He told colleagues that officials were looking at what was on sale in the market, whether all the vendors have licenses (and) if there was any illegal (wildlife) trade happening in the market.
A colleague asked Ben Embarek, who is no longer with WHO, if that seemed unusual. He responded that it was not routine, and that the Chinese must have had some reason to investigate the market. Well try to figure out what happened and why they did that.
Ben Embarek declined to comment. Another WHO staffer at the Geneva meeting in late January 2020 confirmed Ben Embareks comments.
The Associated Press could not confirm the search independently. It remains a mystery if it took place, what inspectors discovered, or whether they sampled live animals that might point to how COVID-19 emerged.
Peter Ben Embarek of a World Health Organization team attends a joint press conference at the end of their mission to investigate the origins of the coronavirus pandemic in Wuhan in Chinas Hubei on Feb. 9, 2021. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan, File)
A Dec. 25, 2019, inspection would have come when Wuhan authorities were aware of the mysterious disease. The day before, a local doctor sent a sample from an ill market vendor to get sequenced that turned out to contain COVID-19. Chatter about the unknown pneumonia was spreading in Wuhans medical circles, according to one doctor and a relative of another who declined to be identified, fearing repercussions.
A scientist in China when the outbreak occurred said they heard of a Dec. 25 inspection from collaborating virologists in the country. They declined to be named out of fear of retribution.
WHO said in an email that it was not aware of the Dec. 25 investigation. It is not included in the U.N. health agencys official COVID-19 timeline.
When China CDC researchers from Beijing arrived on Jan. 1 to collect samples at the market, it had been ordered shut and was already being disinfected, destroying critical information about the virus. Gao Fu, then head of the China CDC, mentioned it to an American collaborator.
His complaint when I met him was that all the animals were gone, said Columbia University epidemiologist Ian Lipkin.
Marion Koopmans, right, and Peter Ben Embarek, center, of the World Health Organization team say farewell to their Chinese counterpart Liang Wannian, left, after a WHO-China Joint Study Press Conference at the end of the WHO mission in Wuhan, China, on Feb. 9, 2021. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan, File)
Robert Garry, who studies viruses at Tulane University, said a Dec. 25 probe would be hugely significant, given what is known about the virus and its spread.
Being able to swab it directly from the animal itself would be pretty convincing and nobody would be arguing about the origins of COVID-19, he said.
But perhaps local officials simply feared for their jobs, with memories of firings after the 2003 SARS outbreak still vivid, said Ray Yip, the founding head of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention outpost in China.
They were trying to save their skin, hide the evidence, Yip said.
The Wuhan government did not respond to a faxed request for comment.
Another early victim was Zhang Yongzhen, the first scientist to publish a sequence of the virus. A day after he wrote a memo urging health authorities to action, Chinas top health official ordered Zhangs lab closed.
They used their official power against me and our colleagues, Zhang wrote in an email provided to AP by Edward Holmes, an Australian virologist.
On Jan. 20, 2020, a WHO delegation arrived in Wuhan for a two-day mission. China did not approve a visit to the market, but they stopped by a China CDC lab to examine infection prevention and controlprocedures, according to an internal WHO travel report. WHOs then-China representative, Dr. Gauden Galea, told colleagues in a private meeting that inquiries about COVID-19s origins went unanswered.
By then, many Chinese were angry at their government. Among Chinese doctors and scientists, the sense grew that Beijing was hunting for someone to blame.
There are a few cadres who have performed poorly, Chinese leader Xi Jinping said in unusually harsh comments in February. Some dare not take responsibility, wait timidly for orders from above, and dont move without being pushed.
The government opened investigations into top health officials, according to two former and current China CDC staff and three others familiar with the matter. Health officials were encouraged to report colleagues who mishandled the outbreak to Communist Party disciplinary bodies, according to two of the people.
Some people both inside and outside China speculated about a laboratory leak. Those suspicious included right-wing American politicians, but also researchers close to WHO.
The focus turned to the Wuhan Institute of Virology, a high-level lab that experimented with some of the worlds most dangerous viruses.
In early February 2020, some of the Wests leading scientists, headed by Dr. Jeremy Farrar, then at Britains Wellcome Trust, and Dr. Anthony Fauci, then director of the U.S. National Institutes of Health, banded together to assess the origins of the virus in calls, a Slack channel and emails.
They drafted a paper suggesting a natural evolution, but even among themselves, they could not agree on the likeliest scenario. Some were alarmed by features they thought might indicate tinkering.
There have (been) suggestions that the virus escaped from the Wuhan lab, Holmes, the Australian virologist, who believed the virus originated in nature, wrote in a Feb. 7, 2020, email. I do a lot of work in China, and I can (assure) you that a lot of people there believe they are being lied to.
American scientists close to researchers at the Wuhan Institute of Virology warned counterparts there to prepare.
James LeDuc, head of a Texas lab, emailed his Wuhan colleague on Feb. 9, 2020, saying hed already been approached by U.S. officials. Clearly addressing this will be essential, with any kind of documentation you might have, he wrote.
The Chinese government was conducting its own secret investigation into the Wuhan Institute. Gao, the then-head of the China CDC, and another Chinese health expert revealed its existence in interviews months and years later. Both said the investigation found no evidence of wrongdoing, which Holmes, the Australian virologist, also heard from another contact in China. But Gao said even he hadnt seen further details, and some experts suspect they may never be released.
WHO started negotiations with China for a further visit with the virus origins in mind, but it was Chinas Foreign Ministry that decided the terms.
Scientists were sidelined and politicians took control. China refused a visa for Ben Embarek, then WHOs top animal virus expert. The itinerary dropped nearly all items linked to an origins search, according to draft agendas for the trip obtained by the AP. And Gao, the then-head of the China CDC who is also a respected scientist tasked with investigating the origins, was left off the schedule.
Instead, Liang Wannian, a politician in the Communist Party hierarchy, took charge of the international delegation. Liang is an epidemiologist close to top Chinese officials and Chinas Foreign Ministry who is widely seen as pushing the party line, not science-backed policies, according to nine people familiar with the situation who declined to be identified to speak on a sensitive subject.
Liang ruled in favor of shutting the Wuhan market at the beginning of the outbreak, according to a Chinese media interview with a top China CDC official that was later deleted. Significantly, it was Liang who promoted an implausible theory that the virus came from contaminated frozen food imported into China. Liang did not respond to an emailed request for comment.
Most of the WHO delegation was not allowed to go to Wuhan, which was under lockdown. The few who did learned little. They again had no access to the Wuhan Institute of Virology or the wildlife market and obtained only scant details about China CDC efforts to trace the coronavirus there.
On the train, Liang lobbied the visiting WHO scientists to praise Chinas health response in their public report. Dr. Bruce Aylward, a senior adviser to WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, saw it as the best way to meet Chinas need for a strong assessment of its response.
The new section was so flattering that colleagues emailed Aylward to suggest he dial it back a bit.
It is remarkable how much knowledge about a new virus has been gained in such a short time, read the final report, which was reviewed by Chinas top health official before it went to Tedros.
As criticism of China grew, the Chinese government deflected blame. Instead of firing health officials, they declared their virus response a success and closed investigations into the officials with few job losses.
There were no real reforms, because doing reforms means admitting fault, said a public health expert in contact with Chinese health officials who asked not to be identified because of the sensitivity of the matter.
In late February 2020, the internationally respected doctor Zhong Nanshan appeared at a news conference and said that the epidemic first appeared in China, but it did not necessarily originate in China.
A policeman moves journalists back from a farewell event held for the last group of medical workers who came from outside Wuhan to help the city during the coronavirus outbreak in Wuhan in central Chinas Hubei province on April 15, 2020. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan, File)
Days later, Chinese leader Xi ordered new controls on virus research. A leaked directive from Chinas Publicity Department ordered media not to report on the virus origins without permission, and a public WeChat account reposted an essay claiming the U.S. military created COVID-19 at a Fort Detrick lab and spread it to China during a 2019 athletic competition in Wuhan. Days later, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson repeated the accusation.
The false claims enraged U.S. President Donald Trump, who began publicly blaming China for the outbreak, calling COVID-19 the China virus and the kung-flu.
Chinese officials told WHO that blood tests on lab workers at the Wuhan Institute of Virology were negative, suggesting COVID-19 wasnt the result of a lab accident there. But when WHO pressed for an independent audit, Chinese officials balked and demanded WHO investigate the U.S. and other countries as well.
By blaming the U.S., Beijing diverted blame. It was effective in China, where many Chinese were upset by racially charged criticism. But outside China, it fueled speculation of a lab leak coverup.
By the time WHO led another visit to Wuhan in January 2021, a year into the pandemic, the atmosphere was toxic.
Liang, the Chinese health official in charge of two earlier WHO visits, continued to promote the questionable theory that the virus was shipped into China on frozen food. He suppressed information suggesting it could have come from animals at the Wuhan market, organizing market workers to tell WHO experts no live wildlife was sold and cutting recent photos of wildlife at the market from the final report. There was heavy political scrutiny, with numerous Chinese officials who werent scientists or health officers present at meetings.
Despite a lack of direct access, the WHO team concluded that a lab leak was extremely unlikely. So it was infuriating to Chinese officials when WHO chief Tedros said it was premature to rule out the lab leak theory, saying such lab accidents were common, and pressed China to be more transparent.
China told WHO any future missions to find COVID-19 origins should be elsewhere, according to a letter obtained by AP. Since then, global cooperation on the issue has ground to a halt; an independent group convened by WHO to investigate the origins of COVID-19 in 2021 has been stymied by the lack of cooperation from China and other issues.
Chinese scientists are still under heavy pressure, according to 10 researchers and healthofficials. Researchers who published papers on the coronavirus ran into trouble with Chinese authorities. Others were barred from travel abroad for conferences and WHO meetings. Gao, the then-director of the China CDC, was investigated after U.S. President Joe Biden ordered a review of COVID-19 data, and again after giving interviews on the virus origins.
New evidence is treated with suspicion. In March 2023, scientists announced that genetic material collected from the market showed raccoon dog DNA mixed with COVID-19 in early 2020, data that WHO said should have been publicly shared years before. The findings were posted, then removed by Chinese researchers with little explanation.
The head of the China CDC Institute of Viral Disease was forced to retire over the release of the market data, according to a former China CDC official who declined to be named to speak on a sensitive topic.
It has to do with the origins, so theyre still worried, the former official said. If you try and get to the bottom of it, what if it turns out to be from China?
Other scientists note that any animal from which the virus may have originally jumped has long since disappeared.
There was a chance for China to cooperate with WHO and do some animal sampling studies that might have answered the question, said Tulane Universitys Garry. The trail to find the source has now gone cold.
Cheng reported from Geneva.
