Covid discovery reveals ‘hidden’ human immune system powers

There are encouraging signs Victoria’s latest, brutal Covid wave may finally have peaked. It comes as Australian scientists discover human immune systems can make their own antivirals.

There are encouraging signs Victoria’s latest, brutal Covid wave may finally have peaked.

The number of people in hospital with Covid across the state declined last week, with an average of 196 people hospitalised a day, compared to 222 the week before.

The average number of Victorians in intensive care also declined from eight to seven, while deaths in the most recent 28-day reporting period dropped to 149.

Wastewater testing in both metropolitan and regional catchments also show decreasing Covid-19 viral loads.

The testing shows JN. 1 (a sublineage of BA. 2.86) remains the dominant Covid variant in Victorian wastewater, accounting for more than 70 per cent of samples.

“This is the first time a single subvariant has been dominant in Victoria since BA. 5 in 2022. JN. 1 is also the dominant variant globally,” the Victorian Department of Health Surveillance Report notes.

How human immune systems make their own antivirals

Fast diagnosis and new drugs are set to follow a huge discovery by Australian Covid researchers of a “hidden”, extended natural immune defence pathway called VIPERIN that creates its own antiviral agents.

Ten compounds were detected in groundbreaking research by the Australian National Phenome Centre (ANPC) in collaboration with scientists from New Zealand, the U.S., U.K and Germany — with nine of them new to human biology knowledge and previously unknown biomarkers of infection.

The discovery, published in the Journal of Proteome Research, will enable the development of new tests for viral infection and new ways to create antiviral drugs that extend beyond the diagnosis and treatment of Covid-19.

The researchers were analysing blood and urine samples from Covid patients when they uncovered a previously largely unknown piece of the natural, human immune system that generates drug-like metabolites which act as antiviral agents.

ANPC director, Professor Jeremy Nicholson, said the discovery of the extended VIPERIN Pathway (X-VIP) greatly expanded scientific knowledge on how the human “innate immune system” reacted to most viral infections.

Professor Jeremy Nicholson, who leads the Australian National Phenome Centre at Murdoch University.

VIPERIN is short for virus inhibitory protein, endoplasmic reticulum-associated, interferon-inducible.

When a virus attacks the human body it triggers an interferon response that VIPERIN helps suppress.

“It is very unusual to discover significant new human biochemical pathways, especially ones that might have major medical significance,” Prof Nicholson said.

The discovery showed the natural human immune system had been making its own antivirals — which helping to protect them against getting sick — since before medicine was invented.

Murdoch University’s Prof Julien Wist said the discovery opened up the possibility of further studies aimed at designing new antiviral drugs.

“Fascinatingly, from a chemical viewpoint these compounds look like antiviral drugs and are highly similar to some compounds that are already marketed by drug companies as antiviral agents,” he said.

Study lead Dr Samuele Sala said genetic evidence suggested the processes were ancient.

“It appears that nature created a mechanism for combating viruses billions of years before humans even existed,” he said.

“Genomic evidence from other research indicates that the VIPERIN gene was present in very early organisms possibly including stromatolite ancestors, descendants of which coincidentally live off the coast of Western Australia.”

Prof Nicholson said Covid had been subjected to unprecedented clinical and scientific scrutiny since emerging globally in late 2019.

While the virus presented with respiratory disease it could also affect all major organs and, for some people, result in debilitating long Covid or post acute Covid-19 syndrome (PACS), he said.

“Understanding why the severity of symptoms in Covid patients is so variable and discovering early markers that accurately define the likely impact on an individual patient, is critical to mitigating the health impacts on current patients, and responding effectively to other pandemic viruses which may emerge in future,” he said.

Has Vic’s Covid wave peaked?

There are encouraging signs Victoria’s latest, brutal Covid wave may finally have peaked.

The number of people in hospital with Covid across the state declined last week, with an average of 196 people hospitalised a day, compared to 222 the week before.

The average number of Victorians in intensive care also declined from eight to seven, while deaths in the most recent 28-day reporting period dropped to 149.

Wastewater testing in both metropolitan and regional catchments also show decreasing Covid-19 viral loads.

The testing shows JN. 1 (a sublineage of BA. 2.86) remains the dominant Covid variant in Victorian wastewater, accounting for more than 70 per cent of samples.

“This is the first time a single subvariant has been dominant in Victoria since BA. 5 in 2022. JN. 1 is also the dominant variant globally,” The Victorian Department of Health Surveillance Report notes.

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