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Medical experts hold a meeting on how to share information to help prevent the further spread of the novel coronavirus on Feb. 3. (provided by the National Institute of Health)

South Korea’s National Institute of Health, under the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC), announced on Feb. 5 that it would start developing medication and a vaccination for the novel coronavirus and conduct research on the pathogenicity of the virus in partnership with domestic researchers sometime this month. Given the current lack of medication for the coronavirus, doctors have been prescribing existing antiviral drugs while combatting its symptoms. Overseas, researchers are assessing whether Remdesivir, an antiviral drug developed to treat Ebola, and Lopinavir and Ritonavir, antiretrovirals that are used to fight HIV, might also be effective against the coronavirus.

The base sequence of the virus isolated by the KCDC is 99.5-99.9% similar to that of the viruses isolated in other countries, including France, Singapore, and Germany, as well as in China’s Guangdong Province and the city of Wuhan. No significant genetic mutations have been discovered. KCDC confirmed the replication of the coronavirus after incubating cells inoculated with sputum and other respiratory samples from patients, and it verified its isolation of the virus by analyzing its base sequence.

The base sequence data has been submitted to the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Global Initiative on Sharing All Influenza Data (GISAID), where it will be used by researchers both inside and outside Korea. The KCDC is planning to send samples of the coronavirus it has isolated to related agencies and qualified organizations for use in further research and development.

By Park Da-hae, staff reporter

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