Covid-like virus Khosta-2 found in bats in Russia

Scientists warn Khosta-2 can use its spike proteins to infect humans very much like Covid and is vaccine-resistant.

A new virus found in bats is capable of infecting humans and evading vaccines, scientists warn.

Khosta-2 can use its spike proteins to infect human cells very much like SARS-CoV-2 does, according to a new study published in the journal PLoS Pathogens.

“Our research further demonstrates that sarbecoviruses circulating in wildlife outside of Asia – even in places like western Russia where the Khosta-2 virus was found – also pose a threat to global health and ongoing vaccine campaigns against SARS-CoV-2,” study lead author Dr Michael Letko, of Washington State University in the US, said in a statement.

He said this discovery highlights the need to develop new vaccines that don’t only target known variants of SARS-CoV-2, such as Omicron, but that protect against all sarbecoviruses.

The new bat virus Khosta-2 can use its spike proteins to infect human cells very much like SARS-CoV-2 does.

The Khosta-1 and Khosta-2 viruses were discovered in bats near Russia’s Sochi National Park in 2020, and it initially appeared they were not a threat to humans, according to the study’s authors.

“Genetically, these weird Russian viruses looked like some of the others that had been discovered elsewhere around the world, but because they did not look like SARS-CoV-2, no one thought they were really anything to get too excited about,” Mr Letko said.

But when they looked at them more, they were “really surprised” to find they could infect human cells.

“That changes a little bit of our understanding of these viruses, where they come from and what regions are concerning,” he said.

Mr Letko and his colleagues determined that Khosta-1 posed a low risk to humans, but Khosta-2 was more concerning.

The authors said that the new virus lacks some of the genetic features thought to “antagonise” the immune system and contribute to disease in humans – but there is a risk that Khosta-2 could wreak havoc by recombining with a second virus such as SARS-CoV-2.

“When you see SARS-2 has this ability to spill back from humans and into wildlife, and then there are other viruses like Khosta-2 waiting in those animals with these properties we really don’t want them to have, it sets up this scenario where you keep rolling the dice until they combine to make a potentially riskier virus,” Mr Letko said.