Jacob Glanville, a San Francisco based doctor, featured in the Netflix documentary "Pandemic" announced that he and his team have discovered a potential coronavirus cure.
Glanville runs the biotech company Distributed Bio and tweeted the other day that the new antibody therapy they discovered, which works by "blocking the novel coronavirus from infecting human cells," is a "candidate cure."
His team took 5 antibodies that were used to in 2002 to bind and neutralize, block and stop the SARS virus, which has been discovered to be a similar cousin to the COVID-19 virus. Researchers took the antibodies that were used to combat the SARS virus, mutated them a little and then found versions that crossed over and could potentially cure the deadly coronavirus.
The new antibodies work by binding to the spot that the virus uses to gain entry into your cells and blocking it.
The therapy will work immediately meaning when given to a sick patient experiencing COVID-19 symptoms, within 20 minutes of receiving the shot their body will be filled with the antibodies that will stick all over the virus making it no longer infectious. The therapy could also be given to healthcare workers or elderly people to help prevent them from receiving the infection in the first place.
Unfortunately, Glanville and his team though have said this antibody therapy can only be used as a short term vaccine. It will only protect recipients for 8 to 10 weeks from the virus, unlike a true vaccine.
The antibodies will be sent to the US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases, so the military can conduct tests and hopefully prove Glanville's validity of the therapy. Another laboratory will then screen the medication to ensure it is safe for humans.
If the medication is deemed both safe and accurate, then Gladville will team up with other companies to begin human trials in the summer, The trials will go to about 500 people that are hospitals with symptoms and the researchers will watch to see how the medication affects them over a 5-10 day period.
If all goes well the earlier the drug could be administered to patients and not just test subjects would be September.
