A team of Chinese scientists has engineered a mutated pangolin coronavirus, GX_P2V, that exhibits a 100% mortality rate in mice genetically modified to resemble humans. This alarming finding, published in a Beijing study last week, raises concerns about the potential for zoonotic transmission and highlights the need for further research into SARS-CoV-2-related viruses.
"This study underscores the spillover risk of GX_P2V into humans and provides a unique model for understanding the pathogenic mechanisms of these viruses," the authors wrote. GX_P2V is a modified version of GX/2017, a distant cousin of SARS-CoV-2 discovered in Malaysian pangolins in 2017. All infected mice succumbed within eight days, a "surprisingly" rapid death rate, according to the researchers. The virus ravaged their lungs, bones, eyes, and tracheas, with severe brain damage ultimately causing their demise.
In the days preceding their deaths, the mice displayed swift weight loss, hunched posture, extreme sluggishness, and, most chillingly, completely white eyes the day before succumbing. While the study is the inaugural one to document a 100% mortality rate in mice infected with the Covid-19 related virus, surpassing previous findings from another research, it is important to note that the implications for human beings remain unclear, according to the researchers.
Francois Balloux, an epidemiology expert from the University College London's Genetics Institute, criticized the research, deeming it "terrible" and scientifically entirely pointless. According to a report of New York Post, I can see nothing of vague interest that could be learned from force-infecting a weird breed of humanised mice with a random virus. Conversely, I could see how such stuff might go wrong,” the professor wrote on X.
The preprint does not specify the biosafety level and biosafety precautions used for the research, he continued. The absence of this information raises the concerning possibility that part or all of this research, like the research in Wuhan in 2016-2019 that likely caused the Covid-19 pandemic, recklessly was performed without the minimal biosafety containment and practices essential for research with a potential pandemic pathogens.