Teaser:
Full show: (David Ho’s part starts at 10 mins 42 seconds)
“Our world has turned upside down and we must respond. I think the solution will come from all of us working together: social distancing, masking, good hygiene to mitigate the spread. But ultimately, the final solution, will be delivered through Science, in terms of vaccines, antibodies and drugs. The question is how quickly can we do that? I have all the confidence that we will get to that. But I don’t know how fast we will move – whether it’ll take a year or two, or three. Nobody really knows. But I think there’s a feeling that we can make a huge impact in the coming 12 months.” – Dr David Ho, Clyde & Helen Wu Professor of Medicine, Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons
As Covid-19 continues to ravage societies and blight or even end the lives of many, scientists are looking for different types of therapeutic treatments to treat and prevent the coronavirus. There already are some, of varying degrees of effectiveness, but scientists are looking for more, particularly those that will be easier and faster to produce and use. One such initiative involves antibodies, the proteins our immune systems make to fight infection.
In this week’s show, we talked to Dr David Ho online about his recent pioneering research into using human antibodies to fight Covid-19. Dr. Ho has been awarded a US$2.1 million grant by Chinese billionaire Jack Ma and another US$2 million by China’s Brii Biosciences to lead his team to develop drugs or antibodies to combat the virus.
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Archive link at RTHK (2020-09-11):
https://www.rthk.hk/tv/dtt31/programme/thepulse/episode/704374
