The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) maintains researchers have engineered antiviral compounds proven to kill several types of coronaviruses in both cells and mice.
The work has also proven effective against SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. The compounds neutralized viruses in human airway cells and improved survival in mice infected with a closely related virus causing Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS).
The success of the compounds calls for further development as treatments for infections with emerging coronaviruses, which currently have few effective antivirals and no approved vaccines.
Emerging coronavirus species such as SARS-CoV-2 and SARS-CoV pose a serious risk to global health and security, the World Health Organization (WHO)
said. The spread of SARS-CoV-2 has caused one of the most dangerous pandemics in modern history, and infections with its cousin MERS-CoV have a fatality rate of almost 35 percent.
The scope of work involved testing several 3C-like protease inhibitors in cells infected with SARS-CoV-2, SARS-CoV, or MERS-CoV, noting one of the compounds, 6e, showed strong activity against SARS-CoV-2 and inhibited viral replication by tenfold in cultured human airway epithelial cells taken from infected donors.
Another potent compound named 6j boosted the odds of survival in mice infected with MERS-CoV, slashed the amount of virus in the lungs and prevented dangerous complications like lung edema.
Researchers plan to conduct further work to determine whether one of the compounds could effectively treat both MERS and COVID-19 in humans.