We need some luck in finding drugs to tackle coronavirus

Dr Keith Souter looks at the best ways to develop drugs and vaccines that can be effective against coronavirus as soon as possible

AS EVERYONE knows there is a desperate search going on around the world to find a suitable and effective vaccine against Covid-19.

At the same time scientists are trying to find and develop drugs that will be effective against it. Since we are told that a vaccine is likely to take many months, probably more than a year to find, it may be that developing drugs that can treat the disease is the answer in the shorter term.

This coronavirus is quite malicious. Once it gets into the body it is like a burglar. It breaks into particular cells and takes over the internal machinery of the cell to make multiple copies of itself. The symptoms of high fever and persistent cough are the result of the body’s immune system as it attempts to get rid of it.

For the majority of people who contract the disease, it is a mild to moderate condition, while some people suffer a severe illness. Tragically, too many people die from it. One of the reasons that it can be so severe is that in some people their immune system goes into overdrive and they suffer from what is called a cytokine storm. When this occurs organs, especially the lungs, get damaged.

Cytokines are tiny proteins that are released from many cells, including those of the immune system. When the virus affects the lungs it triggers an immune response that floods the organs with immune cells. In some patients uncontrolled amounts of cytokines are released, which cause an extreme inflammatory reaction or hyperinflammation.

Scientists say that an effective drug against Covid-19 will have to do three things. Stop it entering the cells in the first place, stop it taking over the cells’ machinery that make replicas of itself and prevent the damage to the lungs and the heart from the cytokine storm.

Developing new drugs is never easy and it is a question of starting with a blank sheet of paper. A better bet could be repurposing known drugs that are already in use for other conditions. This has several advantages, since any side effect profile will already be known.

They will already be developed and they can be quickly entered into drug trials. We need some luck in finding those drugs that will halt the cytokine storm.