| What’s the latest progress in our battle against covid-19? What’s going on – in a technical language that we can all understand? And how has the business community responded?
Last May, CCCC took the unusual step of issuing a Newsletter in mid-month because of the strange and difficult times brought on by the covid-19 disease. We felt the need then to share some optimism regarding the battle against covid-19. Fortunately, the optimism of that report has turned out to have been realistic. Now CCCC lists current progress as we share technical knowledge of humanity’s fight against the disease.
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- Review
| While we will not repeat last May’s Newsletter, we can summarize that of the 86 companies engaged in the vaccine search, we listed 8 that were highly qualified to find a result quickly. We stated that pharmaceutical companies were in it for the sake of humanity, many offering to produce the remedy on a not-for-profit basis. We explained that the development was a 3-stage process involving trials with tens of thousands of people. The Newsletter defined many terms that helped explain what was involved in the vaccine’s development, namely: SARS-CoV-2 (the virus), what a virus is, antigens, antibodies, cells, DNA, RNA, proteins, nucleotides, genes and genome. As we update you about progress today, we will re-define some of these terms to ensure clarity of this second report. We explained the 7 different methods that the 86 companies were using to arrive at a vaccine solution and how many companies were engaged in each. Then we listed 10 huge obstacles to the vaccine’s development all of which have since been overcome. Our prediction that a vaccine would be developed at unprecedented speed, namely by late October, was almost bang on with the announcement in early November of the successes by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna – both American enterprises. |
- The Challenge
| The insidiousness of SARS-CoV-2 virus offers an enormous challenge because:
a. Its proteins (the body’s worker bees) block our own immune system from sounding the alarm of a harmful invader thus preventing us from creating antigens (alarm molecules that tell our immune response system that an invader is at hand). b. When our system finally gets the message of danger, it responds by going into overdrive thereby suffocating the very cells it is trying to protect – especially in the lungs region. c. Surrounding the virus are spikes used for attaching itself to a human cell (and using our cells’ reproductive systems to produce more viruses). The SARS-CoV-2 spikes enter the human’s sugar molecules which by the sugar’s own nature, flexes and swings, making it difficult for our antibodies (fighters of the invader) to attack the virus. d. Like all viruses, SARS-CoV-2 has an explosive reproduction rate. e. The SARS-CoV-2 RNA organelle (part of the cell) is nearly 30,000 bases long, the longest virus ever, (compared with HIV virus at ‘only’ 10,000 bases long). This may be the time to remind you what RNA is, which can be done by also defining its relationship to DNA and to proteins: |
DNA , which stores the body’s genetic information, has the main purpose of giving instructions of what to do next. The first two letters of DNA stand for ‘DeoxyriboNucleic’ followed by a third, ‘Acid’. DNA is held in a steady shape by ladder-like rungs, called bases, connecting between two helixes. (Chemical compounds are broken into categories of either base or acid.) That is, the DNA has structure because of these base pairs – and the structure is unique for each person. The very long, complicated human DNA string extends for 3 billion pairs of repeating sections – and it exists in every one of the human’s 30 trillion cells. (Human cells are able to reproduce themselves making more skin cells, more blood cells, etc.) Despite DNA’s many base pairs, it is dominated by its acidic portion of phosphates (and thus DNA is called a nucleic acid).
RNA has the job of transcribing the DNA instruction into an understandable form and sending the instructions to the ‘things’ that make the body work the way it does. For the most part, those working ‘things’ are proteins. It is RNA that plays the messenger role between the DNA and the proteins. Besides its differing function from DNA, RNA departs from DNA in that the RNA’s form is a single helix, rather than a double helix and it has one base element (of 4) that differs from one of the 4 of DNA.
Proteins are the workers. While the DNA calls the shots in the creature’s story, DNA does none of the work. It tells its cells what to do, informing the cells’ chemical factories which protein molecules to fabricate. That message moves along the RNA chains. Then the protein does the job needed such as moving a muscle or heating up our bodies when it is cold outside. The proteins in the liver cell have different instructions from DNA than do the proteins in the optical cells. Each human cell carries about 1 million protein molecules.
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One such protein, interferon blocks the virus’s ability to use the human cell for reproducing more virus cells. Interferon is one of the class of proteins called cytokines. Cytokines for their part, warn nearby cells to put up defenses, initiate the death of an infected cell, or heighten the alarm to bring in more cytokines. (Specifically, it is the interferons that go into overdrive – 2b, above.)
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- More Clarity
Some readers of our past covid-19 news report indicated that they still had difficulty getting a
handle on DNA, RNA etc. so perhaps an analogy might assist. The DNA that resides in each cell is like a master plan for the individual, all cells holding a copy of that master plan. Imagine that DNA is the musical score for a symphony. It does not play the music but lays out what is to be played. The director of the orchestra, like RNA, conveys the message, that is, the details of what is to be played to the musicians, the worker bees, or the proteins in our body, all of whom possess a copy of the musical score. In the musical score are little groups of notes called chords. In our DNA are little groups of base pairs called genes (of which there are 23,000 in the human symphony). Putting some of those genes together to form a more complex entity such as our hair color and when to go bald, we form musical phrases or stanzas in the symphony, but called chromosomes in the human, such as the Y chromosome to define me as a male. We have 23 pairs or 46 individual chromosomes just as a symphony might have 20 or 30 stanzas throughout.
- We’re not all Doomed
Yet, for 95% of infected humans, the immune system does its job when the SARS-CoV-2 virus
appears, whereas 5% succumb mildly to drastically. But even if we are not affected, we can easily pass on our infection to others. Herein lies one of SAR-CoV-2’s great dangers: people walking around not knowing they are infected and passing the virus onto surrounding humans.
- Drugs vs. Vaccines
| Vaccines are designed to fool the immune system into becoming aware of a potential threat, thus creating long-lasting antigens, alarms ready to be triggered. When the real virus appears, the antigens immediately release signals to line up our own antibodies to begin battle, destroying the virus before it can do any serious damage.
Drugs, on the other hand, are unable to trigger the destruction of the virus but are like the blocker on a football field, interfering enough with the virus to prevent it from having full effect. (Blockers don’t scare a touchdown, but they allow the fullback to run an extra 5 yards.) This interference gives sufficient breathing space, so to speak, for the human’s immune system to attack the infection. It is a one-shot protection deal whereas the vaccine hangs around in our system for years.
The completion of the development of covid-19-fighting drugs took place within a few months of last April’s alarm. Donald Trump was inoculated with a drug to give him immediate relief for his covid-19 illness. It was not a cure as he so blatantly announced.
Drugs have several approaches to do their job: a. They stop the SARS-CoV-2 virus from attacking the lung cells, its main avenue of infection b. They prevent the virus from using the human cell’s reproductive system to create more viruses c. They dampen the overdrive reaction of our immune system (see #2b, above). The anti-inflammatory capability of some drugs suppresses the out-of-whack immune system. |
- Progress with Vaccines
| The disease has been devastating with 8.2 million cases reported worldwide by the end of 2020, and with nearly 2 million deaths.
While the previous covid-19 Newsletter of CCCC listed 9 ways that vaccines could be developed, today we list the three that have shown to be more effective, that is, enabling scientists to create and deliver a reliable vaccine more quickly. |
- Method one puts the genes (which are instructions for the RNA) of the covid-19 virus itself into the structure of a harmless virus. Then it injects that harmless virus into the human, thus presenting the human immune system with the ability to form the antigen. The antigen which can be described as an alarm system which believes it has had an infection with the real virus and now is ready when the actual real virus arrives. Ebola, and some veterinary vaccines form this type, which is called the recombinant vector
- Another vaccine approach is to add a covid-19 gene to the outer coat of a harmless virus in the lab. This vaccine is specifically targeted to incapacitate the virus’s spike proteins that appear on the virus’s outer layer. Then a huge quantity of these doctored spikes is manufactured. This method is used currently for hepatitis B vaccine. The result of working just with the spike of a harmless virus is to be able to make lots of copies of the free-floating spike proteins cure – hence greater ease of replication. This is called the protein subunit As above, this fools the immune system to fabricate alarm cells (antigens). When the real virus appears, the antigens, which are already in place, signal the antibodies to start the war. (This is the Pfizer-BioNTech approach.)
- Rather than adding an independent gene, the third approach introduces the nasty viral gene itself (for the antigen’s consideration) in the form of a piece of the real virus’s DNA or RNA molecule (where the virus’s genes are stored). These are called nucleic-acid vaccines (since DNA and RNA are nucleic acids). The production of nucleic-acid vaccines is completely independent of outside viruses, making unwanted contamination most unlikely, thus ensuring that this vaccine is safe for high-scale production. (This is the approach that Moderna used with its 30,000 test humans.)
- Actions
From a business point of view, this 8-month hiatus from ‘normal business endeavors’ has
created different reactions from: ‘Let’s wait till this thing blows over’ to ‘Let’s try to adapt somewhat’ to ‘Let’s build our business in this new reality’. An example is the last category is Beckta Dining in Ottawa which delivers quality meals at $100 a pop with video instructions of how to ensure the meal remains delicious. Delivering 600 meals per week offers a business level exceeding their previous in-dining experience level (that’s $60,000 a week, folks). Other restaurants kept the bottom line from suffering by increasing external meal deliveries but at nowhere near the volume of their previous in-dining experience. Thirdly, many restaurants unable to adapt, have had to close their doors.
- Conclusion
| Humanity has collaborated unlike any other time in the world history towards defeating a
human threat. Businesses have responded to the new situation with differing degrees of belief of its impact on the enterprise and experienced corresponding successes (and failures). |
Bill