Coronavirus has 'stable genome,' study suggests, so vaccine could help 'over many years'

Fox News ^ | 03/27/2020 | By Chris Ciaccia

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Currently, there is no known specific medicine to treat the novel coronavirus, but researchers in Italy suggest that the COVID-19 disease is slow to mutate, based on its genetic material.

This finding could aid in helping large swaths of people over an extended period of time once a specific cure is found.

The study, which was produced by two independent teams in the country, used "a new next-generation sequencing (NGS) research assay" from Thermo Fisher Scientific on Italian COVID-19 patients. The experts then compared them to a sample from the original outbreak to come up with their findings.

"Had we investigated other viruses we might have expected up to dozens of new mutations after so many infectious cycles in patients," professor Stefano Menzo, head of Virology at Ancona University Hospital, said in a statement. "Our initial data show that this is a very stable RNA virus, with only five novel variants. A virus with a stable genome is good news for vaccine development because it indicates that the effectiveness of vaccines could be more consistent, possibly over many years."

Dr. Maria Rosaria Capobianchi, head of the Virology Department, Lazzaro Spallanzani National Institute for Infectious Diseases, said the ability to run quick, multiple samples is important in the scientific community's fight to stay ahead of the virus.

However, Capobianchi cautioned, "viral genomes are dynamic and these preliminary data need further analysis to determine the biological significance of the gene variants and to investigate the evolutionary path of the coronavirus."

The researchers will further analyze the data with Thermo Fisher's new Ion SARS-CoV-2 analysis solution to better understand the virus and analyze the entire genome.

Scientists are looking at a number of different ways to cure the novel coronavirus, which has affected more than 428,000 people around the globe,

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...researchers in Italy suggest that the COVID-19 disease is slow to mutate, based on its genetic material. This finding could aid in helping large swaths of people over an extended period of time once a specific cure is found... "Had we investigated other viruses we might have expected up to dozens of new mutations after so many infectious cycles in patients," professor Stefano Menzo, head of Virology at Ancona University Hospital, said in a statement. "Our initial data show that this is a very stable RNA virus, with only five novel variants. A virus with a stable genome is good news for vaccine development because it indicates that the effectiveness of vaccines could be more consistent, possibly over many years." Dr. Maria Rosaria Capobianchi... cautioned, "viral genomes are dynamic and these preliminary data need further analysis to determine the biological significance of the gene variants and to investigate the evolutionary path of the coronavirus."

Coronavirus has 'stable genome,' study suggests, so vaccine could help 'over many years'

Topic from 03/27/2020. I'm no microbiologist, but as I walked today, this topic popped up in my mind, and I got to wondering, what if this isn't a novel virus, but coincides with the annual flu outbreak? It's difficult to believe that people who die of the flu have had their infection cultured to identify it. Perhaps this particular coronavirus has been around for a long long time, and a tiny variability made it much worse this year, calling attention to it.