Biomedicine in the COVID Age: Opportunities, Responses, and Challenges

According to one of the earliest definitions, biomedicine means “clinical medicine based on the principles of physiology and biochemistry.” Clinicians for quite some time preferred the use of the term medical research to describe what they considered the clinical findings pertaining to various issues related to clinical studies. Since the time when the basic molecules of life, deoxyribonucleic acids, were characterized and the genetic code elucidated, there has been great excitement, anticipation, and promise for the development of precision and personalized medicine. However, the progress has been considerably slow and at times disappointing. The unprecedented coronavirus disease created a worldwide panic and exposed all our weaknesses and unpreparedness. It also demonstrated a global demand for better public health infrastructure and preparedness to combat future pandemics. This unprecedented public health crisis acted as a great stimulus for putting together a concerted effort to develop vaccines. According to the experts, the time was right and within 48 hours after the information on the SARS-CoV-2 genome was posted, Moderna scientists had on paper a workable mRNA, which would code for the spike protein. The immune engineers at Moderna as well as BioNTech were able to put together a lipid nanoparticle delivery system for safe delivery of this precious cargo to the appropriate cells. Professor Cody Meissner at Tufts University School of Medicine in Boston says, “It is absolutely astonishing that this happened [COVID Vaccine development] in such a short time—to me, it is equivalent to putting a person on the Moon.” It is indeed a great achievement, and it demonstrated the power of basic science and emerging technologies. The extraordinary success of mRNA vaccines has opened new avenues for mRNA-based therapies. mRNAs, siRNAs, and non-coding miRNAs will play a very important role as novel therapeutics soon. Furthermore, this success has acted as a catalyst for ongoing work on the use of small RNAs for therapeutic purposes. Having said that, I must say that there are a great many challenges that need to be addressed.