A new treatment for the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) has been found to protect mice from infection, according to a study.
MERS, a disease that can cause severe respiratory symptoms and has a mortality rate of 40 percent notably it has already killed nearly 600 people since it was first discovered four years ago in Saudi Arabia.
Treatment – an antibody that blocks the virus MERS – was produced by cows that had been genetically modified to mimic certain aspects of the human immune system.
These antibodies were then purified to produce the therapeutic to be tested in mice infected with MERS.
SAB, a pharmaceutical company based in South Dakota, United States provided genetically modified cows, a technology that was invented.
Novavax a vaccine biotechnology company based in Maryland in the US provides a vaccine elicited the production of antibodies in cows.
