Don't worry! The next generation would be more resistant to SARS-CoV-2

Excerpt

This letter addresses our concerns regarding the paper “SARS‑CoV‑2 will continue to circulate in the human population: an opinion from the point of view of the virus‑host relationship” published recently in the Inflammation Research [1]. Oberemok et al., the authors of this flawed paper, have used speculation to forecast upcoming events about COVID-19 pandemic. Besides some major shortcomings, the basis for these predictions is not clear. In our previous papers we noted the advantages of low dose radiation therapy (LDRT) and discussed that some drug-based therapies such as using antivirals can drive the virus into evolution through new mutations [2‐6]. While nobody really knows what will happen in the future with current and future SARS-CoV-2 strains and how they will evolve under different levels of selective pressure, Oberemok et al. state that “Deaths among people of reproductive age will gradually lead to a human population in which the next generations will be more resistant to this virus”. They also state that “Taking into consideration the natural genetic mechanisms of mutations and recombination, it is impossible to imagine how to deprive a virus of the opportunity to generate new strains and time to time threaten our world with new pandemics”. Oberemok et al. only focus on the natural selection of humans and ignore the key point that, at least in the case of widespread use of vaccines and antiviral drugs, natural selection of the SARS-CoV-2 will also drive the virus to more mutations through an evolutionary process [7]. As they infect people, all viruses mutate and SARS-CoV-2 is not likely an exception [8]. This is exactly the reason why modulation of the host immune response, in contrast with using antiviral agents, reveals the advantage of exerting less-selective pressure on the virus [7]. The immune response of the host, viral replication, and viral mutation rate are among the major factors that affect human-to-human transmission of SARS-CoV-2 [9]. Using an antiviral therapeutic agent has always been a significant concern because it has the potential to produce drug resistance due to rapid viral mutations [10]. Our experience about other life-threatening viral infections such as HIV lead us to this conclusion that in many individuals, in the presence of the selective pressure of antiviral drugs, residual replication of the virus results in the emergence of drug-resistant strains, finally causing a therapeutic failure [11‐13]. A report published recently in Science warns about the dangers of the selective pressures caused by the advent of vaccines or new therapies and states “Perhaps there’s just little selection pressure on the virus as it races through millions of immunologically naïve people, scientists say. That could change with the advent of vaccines or new therapies, forcing the virus to evolve” [14]. Given this consideration, next generations will not necessarily be more resistant to new variants of the virus. In Fig. 1 we provide a more realistic picture about the future of COVID-19 compared to the original figure of the Oberemok et al. This representation is one of many possible outcomes, but it is more consistent with viral behavior and current research that the forecast of Oberemok et al.

…