Potential new treatment for Covid-19 identified by scientists

The new treatment uses biological substances created by re-engineered human skin cells has been identified by investigators at Cedars-Sinai for Covid-19.

Until now the existing Covid-19 treatment methods primarily focus solely on preventing the virus from replicating. However, scientists have claimed that the new treatment inhibits replication but also protects or repairs tissue, which is important because COVID-19 can cause symptoms that affect patients long after the viral infection has been cleared.

The potential therapy investigated in this study was created by scientists using skin cells called dermal fibroblasts. The investigators engineered the cells to produce therapeutic extracellular vesicles (EVs), which are nanoparticles that serve as a communication system between cells and tissue. Engineering these fibroblasts allowed them to secrete EVs–which the investigators dubbed “ASTEX”–with the ability to repair tissue.

In previous experiments, the investigators demonstrated that ASTEX can repair heart tissue, lung tissue and muscle damage in laboratory mice. When the COVID-19 pandemic hit in 2020, the investigators turned to study whether ASTEX could be used as treatment against SARS-CoV-2.

The study was done through a collaboration with investigators at UCLA who tested ASTEX by applying it to human lung epithelial cells, cells that line the pulmonary tract and are the targets of SARS-CoV-2 infection.

They discovered that ASTEX prevented cells from launching an inflammatory process that could lead to cell death. Cells treated with ASTEX also made fewer of a type of protein called ACE that SARS-CoV-2 may use to infect cells.

The team then compared the potential treatment with remdesivir, a drug currently used to treat COVID-19, and found that remdesivir did not inhibit the production of ACE. Instead, remdesivir stops the virus from latching on to a protein called ACE2. ASTEX, therefore, may present another way to prevent the virus from entering cells.

“Viruses don’t have their own machinery to get into cells, so they use proteins,” Ibrahim said. “We believe targeting ACE proteins is just one way SARS-CoV-2 infiltrates cells, hijacks their genetic information and replicates itself in the body.”

ASTEX appears to have stopped this hijacking process.

(With ANI inputs)