Giuseppe MichieliWhat is the #relationship between #viral #prospecting in #animals and medical #countermeasure development? MedRxIV: https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2024.08.09.24311747v1
With #Filoviridae as a case study, we show there is little #evidence to suggest that viral prospecting has accelerated countermeasure development or that systematically discovering novel #zoonotic viruses in animal hosts before they cause human outbreaks has been feasible.
What is the relationship between viral prospecting in animals and medical countermeasure development?
In recent decades, surveillance in nonhuman animals has aimed to detect novel viruses before they 'spill over' to humans. However, the extent to which these viral prospecting efforts have enhanced preparedness for disease outbreaks remains poorly characterized, especially in terms of whether they are necessary, sufficient, or feasible ways to spur medical countermeasure development. We find that several viruses which pose known threats to human health lack approved vaccines and that known viruses discovered in human patients prior to 2000 have caused most major 21st-century outbreaks. With Filoviridae as a case study, we show there is little evidence to suggest that viral prospecting has accelerated countermeasure development or that systematically discovering novel zoonotic viruses in animal hosts before they cause human outbreaks has been feasible. These results suggest that prospecting for novel viral targets does not accelerate a rate-limiting step in countermeasure development and underscore questions about the importance of zoonotic viral discovery for outbreak preparedness. We consider limitations to these conclusions and alternative but related approaches to preparedness and response. ### Competing Interest Statement A.V.A. was an intern for CEPI in 2023 and is a consultant for Centivax, Inc. M.L. is on the Scientific Advisory Board for CEPI. ### Funding Statement M.L. thanks the VK fund for CCDD, Open Philanthropy, and the DALHAP fund for supporting this work. ### Author Declarations I confirm all relevant ethical guidelines have been followed, and any necessary IRB and/or ethics committee approvals have been obtained. Yes I confirm that all necessary patient/participant consent has been obtained and the appropriate institutional forms have been archived, and that any patient/participant/sample identifiers included were not known to anyone (e.g., hospital staff, patients or participants themselves) outside the research group so cannot be used to identify individuals. Yes I understand that all clinical trials and any other prospective interventional studies must be registered with an ICMJE-approved registry, such as ClinicalTrials.gov. I confirm that any such study reported in the manuscript has been registered and the trial registration ID is provided (note: if posting a prospective study registered retrospectively, please provide a statement in the trial ID field explaining why the study was not registered in advance). Yes I have followed all appropriate research reporting guidelines, such as any relevant EQUATOR Network research reporting checklist(s) and other pertinent material, if applicable. Yes Data used for this analysis are available in Supplementary Information.
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