A latest research has identified considerable changes in the coronavirusduring its local transmission across different localities in worldincluding Pakistan.
The Quaid-i-Azam University collaborated with scientific facilities inChina and the United States for the research, titled “Evolutionary andstructural analysis of SARS-CoV-2 specific evasion of host immunity”, whichwas published in Nature’s Genes & Immunity journal.
This study found that evolutionary substitution may change and realign thesecondary structural elements of the SARS-CoV-2 to create newintra-proteins contacts that may enhance the virus’s ability to inhibithost immunity.
According to details, the team found that the changes to the virus hadimproved its ability to inhibit the human immune system. This is why thecoronavirus spreads so fast to the lower respiratory tract of humans andcauses severe respiratory syndrome.
Moreover, the researchers screened the genomes of more than 160 virusesfrom 40 countries. Their findings and data add to a growing body ofevidence that coronaviruses share a common ancestor from late 2019,suggesting this was when the virus jumped from a previous animal host intohumans.
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The professor and chairperson of the National Centre for Bioinformatic atQAU and co-lead of the research Dr Amir Ali Abbasi remarked his team’sscientific work can assist in designing small-molecule inhibitors thatperturb specific functions of coronavirus in the suppression of hostimmunity, which may help to reduce disease burden and assist recovery ofpatients.
Pakistan, he summoned, is currently facing the second and most deadlyoutbreak of COVID-19. He indicated it as an urgent need to generate andanalyse large-scale genetic data of COVID-19 to see what is causingcoronavirus in Pakistan.
This genetic information can be used in combination with epidemiologicaldata to inform public health decision-making in Pakistan and prevent thevirus from spreading even more, Dr Amir remarked.
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