Vancouver researchers on the frontlines of pandemic

They can be heard at 7 p.m. every evening: ringing bells, clanging pots, honking horns, and blaring sirens sounding out in support of health-care workers during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Among the workers on the frontlines are researchers at Providence Health Care who are trying to understand the virus and how to control and cure it.

“The epidemic grows rapidly and so we need to be in front of it to study patients right from the onset as best we can so that we can get a large sample size” and “understand the full spectrum of COVID-19,” said Dr. Jim Russell, a professor of medicine at UBC and a researcher with the Centre for Heart Lung Innovation at St. Paul’s Hospital.

Russell and a team of researchers have received nearly $256,000 from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research to study whether blood pressure drugs called angiotensin II type 1 receptor blockers (ARBs) can lower the seriousness and mortality rates of COVID-19 infections.

They believe ARBs have decreased the viral load and severity of pneumonia in influenza cases, and suggest the drugs can be used to fight the new coronavirus too. “Curiously, the COVID-19 uses the same receptor as several of the influenza viruses (H1N1, H5N1) and the SARS virus,” said Russell.

His team of researchers is also looking at biomarkers in the blood that might predict better responses to ARBs and whether people already taking the drugs are less likely to face serious cases of COVID-19.

“Our study nicely complements other studies of anti-viral drugs and vaccines” by scientists, said Russell.

Dr. Jeffrey Joy is another research scientist at St. Paul’s, working at the B.C. Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS.

Joy and a team also backed by a grant from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research are studying the genomic evolution of COVID-19. According to a press release, they believe comparing available genomes with the genomes of other coronaviruses will help them find similarities and patterns of spread.

They are working with various Canadian teams and the Chinese Centre for Disease Control headquartered in China.

Another two teams of scientists at the B.C. Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS are analyzing COVID-19 looking for clues that will lead to better testing and treatment thanks to Genome BC’s Rapid Response Funding for COVID-19 Research Projects.

Back at the Centre for Heart Lung Innovation, two respiratory physicians have found that smokers and people with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease have higher levels of ACE-2, a receptor that the novel coronavirus uses to enter the body.

Now, researchers are trying to discover which drugs can inhibit ACE-2 receptors to potentially make it more difficult for the virus to infect a person and cause pneumonia. They are also studying if using an inhaler can increase a person’s risk of developing a serious case.

“This work is made possible thanks to an extensive biobank of lung samples that are collected and housed at St. Paul’s,” said Dr. Janice Leung. The Centre for Heart Lung Innovation has “one of the largest lung biobanks in the world, which we can now use to answer some of the most urgent questions regarding COVID-19.”

Leung is working with Dr. Don Sin, who is also working in collaboration with professors from Simon Fraser University on rapid and cost-effective test for the virus. They are working on a test that would use nasal or throat swabs to detect the new coronavirus in less than 30 minutes and could  be used in airports, hospitals, and border crossings.

“As COVID-19 spreads to an increasing number of places around the world, new strains of SARS-CoV-2 - the virus that causes COVID-19 - may develop,” said Sin.

He hopes his research will develop a test for the virus and “a rapid generation of health data during the evolution of this global pandemic.”

Providence Health Care has also made headlines during the pandemic by opening Vancouver’s first drive thru COVID-19 test site with Vancouver Coastal Health and by running Canada’s first high-throughput, fully automated COVID-19 testing method.

Meanwhile, Bob and Diane Conconi of the Vancouver-based Conconi Foundation have pledged to do even more than bang pots and pans to support local efforts to test and treat COVID-19.

The couple offered to match up to $500,000 of donations to COVID-19 response funds through St. Paul’s and the Vancouver General Hospital and UBC Hospital Foundation. In less than two weeks, community donors matched the Conconi funds.

Now, the Y.P. Heung Foundation has offered to match donations up to an additional $300,000. Other Vancouverites have found ways to support health-care workers by offering meals and even some chocolate eggs on Easter morning.

For more information and to support Providence Health Care’s response to COVID-19 visit the St. Paul’s Response Fund at helpstpauls.com.