Over the past nine months of the COVID-19 pandemic, scientists have learned a lot about the virus, but one mystery still plaguing doctors and patients is why some people have mild cases, while others become so sick they die.
While COVID-19 has such a wide range of outcomes, Arizona scientists at TGen think it could be a molecule that factors into how sick someone gets.
“It’s a tough fight,” Chris Paddock, said.
Paddock is still healing from COVID-19. He says he started feeling symptoms last Wednesday morning.
“I felt really tight in the chest to where I couldn’t take a deep breath,” Paddock said.
His symptoms led him to go to HonorHealth Deer Valley, where he was admitted.
“They took me in immediately because my oxygen level started dropping pretty quickly,” Paddock said.
Paddock said he ended up staying in the COVID-19 unit for a week. While he was there he said he received Remdesivir and antibody treatment to help him. All the while, trying to stay positive since he lost family members of his own to the virus.
“You either stabilize, you get better or it gets worse,” Paddock said. “And that was kind of the best I had for the comfort.”
It’s the wide range of outcomes that are having scientists look deeper.
“We wouldn’t be in this mess if it was like every other virus that has infected humans,” Nicholas Schork, Ph.D., director of TGen’s Quantitative Medicine and Systems Biology Division said.
Schork is leading a team of researchers looking at what’s called miR1307.
It’s a molecule made by DNS that turns genes on and off.
“What we found is that miR1307 appears to interact with the virus and now we’re trying to figure out if that’s a good thing or a bad thing for the human host,” Schork said.
Think of it like a dimmer switch. Schork said they believe depending on how much miR1307 someone has, will affect how sick they get with COVID.
They’re still researching whether miR1307 helps or hurts someone with the virus, but past science has shown it’s played a part in other diseases like certain cancers and H1N1.
“Oftentimes these amounts of substances like miR1307 vary from tissue to tissue,” Schork said.
As Paddock continues healing, he’s left thinking of those who are still in the worst of their battle.
“You can just hear other people, other patients in other rooms just coughing, gasping you know? Almost fight for their life too,” Paddock said.
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