Coronavirus update: Need abbreviations for vaccine approval
translated by Corona InvestigativeBroadcasting date: 18.03.2020 12:15
The risk to the population is high, according to the latest assessment of SARS-CoV-2 by the Robert Koch Institute. This is the second highest of four levels. At present, the reported infections in Germany roughly double every two and a half days, not to mention the reported infections.
Because if there's one thing we've learned in this podcast, it's to be careful with numbers. Also, and especially with official figures, because there are many imponderables, many undiscovered infections in relation to discovered deaths, for example - or the question of whether different numbers on the time axis even fit together. Nevertheless, we want to talk a lot about numbers today. There are new bills from London that we urgently want to examine.
We will be discussing these and other topics again today with Christian Drosten, the head of Virology at the Charité in Berlin.
The central questions of the episode at a glance
What do you say to the critics on the net who say: Corona viruses have always existed, but now there is a special one more?
Can you briefly explain how you established the PCR test back then and who looked at it, in layman's terms?
The Imperial College in London has published a new prognosis on how infection figures and deaths will continue. Already in people over 60, more than one in four infected people end up in intensive care. What do you think of this calculation?
To what extent do you think it is transferable to Germany as a whole? This study is about Great Britain and the USA.
Would it not actually make sense to completely isolate the older patients and let the others develop herd immunity in the meantime? But the figures of the study clearly speak against it.
Korinna Hennig: Mr. Drosten, before we turn to your scientific findings, we should deal today with voices that are no longer so rare, and which express the opinion: "Still everything is exaggerated. The most prominent pioneer of this group is Wolfgang Wodarg, a politician and a pneumologist, i.e. a lung specialist, who has published a YouTube video and a branded letter, which are currently being pretty much circumvented and are also being distributed in the social media. Wodarg says: "The virologists are just happy because they have discovered something new. Corona viruses in general have always been around, this is just one more special one. And the deaths would actually have remained hidden in the statistics if they hadn't been searched for specifically. After all, corona viruses have always been found in seven to 15 percent of people with flu symptoms.
Christian Drosten: That's right, so of course there are corona viruses, four of them in the human population. They are endemic, i.e. seasonal, and occur mainly when it is flu season. And this frequency, which is also roughly correct, can be proven. But they have nothing to do with the new coronavirus.
Korinna Hennig: What is different?
Christian Drosten: Well, this new corona virus is now coming to us as a pandemic. That means there will be a wave of infection if we do nothing. And this wave of infection is the simultaneous occurrence of many coronavirus infections. And even if these coronavirus infections with the new coronavirus were as harmless as those with the four well-known human coronaviruses, that would be alarming. Because there are simply too many cases at once. In addition, the course of the new coronavirus is not as harmless as that of these well-known, long-established coronaviruses.
Korinna Hennig: A few episodes ago, we talked about how it is with seasonal flu or a pandemic flu wave with the U-curve and the W-curve, so children and old people are usually most affected by influenza, and if it then spreads, then it also affects middle-aged people in terms of severe courses. Aimed at the deaths: When critics say that deaths are actually hidden in the statistics, as you have already indicated, because strictly speaking old people die of some cause anyway - why is this different here, perhaps with regard to Italy?
Christian Drosten: Well, it's simply the question: How many cases occur at once in how short a time? Of course, it is not the case that in one season, i.e. in the winter months, when we have these normal corona viruses, many, i.e. a significant part of the population, is infected with these viruses. These are simply far fewer infections. And that is why you cannot compare all of this. And to make a comparison now and say that this new corona virus has not yet appeared in comparison with the cases in the population, which are dying anyway, that is of course correct. So far it has not been significant. There are deaths in the statistics because of this new coronavirus, but they are of course negligible in comparison with the overall mortality of the population. But that's about to change. We're on the rising edge of an exponential growth kinetics right now. And if we don't do something now, and do it drastically and incisively, then it will continue. Then we will have a problem in June and July. Then we will have a situation in which we will very definitely see an effect on lethality, on those who are dying anyway, in other words on the number of those who are dying anyway.
And you will not only see that in the statistics, you will see it in the hospitals. These patients will then no longer be able to be treated, and they will die. That is what is happening in Italy right now.
A psychological repression mechanism?
And if you want to reject that, I would now classify it purely psychologically as a repression mechanism. I myself, I have a family, and I have my repression mechanisms. I also have to find my ways to deal with it. And sometimes I have to put it out of my mind and tell myself, well, maybe it won't be so bad after all. But if I then really switch off this repression and start calculating, then I have to acknowledge that it will come badly, really badly. I can only repeat that here. And we must therefore absolutely do something to prevent the worst from happening. Of course, I believe that we in Germany are well on the way to doing so. Many have not yet understood this. You still see a lot of people handling it rather carelessly. I live here in the middle of Berlin and I can still see people sitting in front of the bars and also being in the bars. That should stop now slowly. And of course there are other ways to deal with that. And perhaps one way of dealing with it is to say: I'm going out into the public and put forward some steep theses and say: None of that exists.
Korinna Hennig: We have now spoken about forecasts for Germany. Are we in Italy already in the range of this excess mortality? In other words, more deaths than the normal statistics would suggest with various causes of death?
Christian Drosten: So in the same evaluation period, yes. You can't say, you take the deaths of the whole year and then you count the coronavirus deaths against it, no matter in which period they died. They died in a few weeks. Then you have to say that you have to divide the whole year and compare it with these few weeks. And it is relatively obvious that you can then count it, that you can then see it. And then, in addition, it is not at all about counting the dead and saying, oh, the number is not so high, then it is not so bad. It is also about the fact that we have serious illnesses and we do not want to be on a ventilator. That is, of course, one option for saving people. But of course this is not something where you say: Oh, then I'll go to the hospital, then I'll be intubated and ventilated for a few days, and then I'll be fine again. Well, it's not like that. We have to prevent cases and we also have to prevent people from needing to be ventilated. And the calculations that you can make now, when everyone is trying to get some kind of clarity about figures that indicate that we might be able to get things right in Germany. If, at the same time, we increase ventilation capacities and impose drastic measures on society in order to stop the increase in the number of cases.
Korinna Hennig: If we look again at the four corona viruses known so far in humans: These are mostly normal cold viruses. But how often does a severe course of the disease occur anyway, just for a brief scientific explanation?
Christian Drosten: Well, severe courses of the disease always occur, the figure mentioned earlier, seven to 15 percent, is almost a bit high, I would rather say five to ten percent of the normal cold diseases in winter are coronavirus findings. And there are always severe cases. We always see severe cases of coronavirus infections in intensive care units, even in young people. I can remember several young patients who died because of coronavirus infections, in intensive care units in Germany. However, these were almost always people who were terminally ill, who had a haematological disease, for example a form of blood cancer, in the background, or other reasons for immunosuppression. And there are also always older people who die from such harmless coronavirus infections. But of course, there are never that many.
Korinna Hennig: The critical voices, especially the quoted Wolfgang Wodarg, also directly relate to the PCR test, i.e. the genetic test for the virus that you and your team have developed and that is used worldwide. It has not been validated at all, i.e. it has not been sufficiently scientifically assessed, and it was not even developed on the basis of the current SARS-CoV-2 genome and would therefore show all kinds of other things. Can you briefly explain to us how you established the PCR test back then and who looked at it, in layman's terms?
Christian Drosten: This test was done at a time when we ourselves did not have this virus in the country or in the laboratory. And we started developing it on the basis of the closely related SARS corona virus. But now this has nothing to do with the common cold corona viruses. It is genetically very distant. And we have done two tests. Actually, we have even done a whole series of tests, of candidate tests. And these were made on the basis of the old SARS corona virus and a huge diversity of bat corona viruses, i.e. the closest relatives, which are all in the same virus species. And we have done tests that would detect a whole range of these coronaviruses. So these animal coronaviruses, bat coronaviruses, would also be included. And the old SARS corona virus and then, in all likelihood, the new one as well. And then the sequence of the new coronavirus came out. So we matched that.
Korinna Hennig: From China.
Christian Drosten: From China, by colleagues, but only theoretically as sequence information. Then we took from our candidate tests the two tests that fit particularly well with this new virus. We then validated them further, with the University of Hong Kong, the University of Rotterdam, the national public health organisation in London and our own patients. A very, very large validation study has been carried out. I would have to open it up on my computer now to go back to the figures again. But we have large numbers of real patient samples - with known positive evidence of other corona viruses and also all the other cold viruses that we know of, and a whole number of these for each individual virus - and a whole number of patient samples, that is hundreds of samples with other corona viruses and other cold viruses, have been tested in this test. And not once has there been a false positive reaction. So this test does not react against any other human corona virus or against any other human cold virus.
It is true, but this is of course completely misleading information, in theory this test would react against the old SARS corona virus. But that has not been present in humans for 16 years. And, purely theoretically, this test would also react against a whole range of bat coronaviruses, but these do not exist in humans either.
Validation at a high level
And it is the same, for example, if we now look at other cold coronavirus tests. For example, there is a coronavirus in humans, a cold coronavirus, the test would definitely also cross-react against a bovine coronavirus that causes diarrhoea in cattle, these viruses are very similar. And another one, that would cross-react against a camel corona virus. And by that I do not mean the MERS virus, but another of our normal cold viruses. But this has absolutely no relation to medical diagnostics and the value of the data for epidemiology. We are only testing the new coronavirus in humans with this test. If we test a patient sample and it is positive, then it is this new corona virus and in no case one of the known other corona viruses.
And the type of technical validation is at such a high level, and we already published this in January, it was one of the first scientific publications ever about this new virus, that an incredibly large number of companies, not only in Germany, but all over the world, have started to immediately transfer this test into commercially validated test systems because of these so good validation data. And at the same time, the World Health Organization has immediately put this test protocol on its website so that all public health agencies can use it.
And we also immediately started distributing the essential material worldwide. We started immediately in mid-January, incidentally at zero cost, so we are involved in a research project that is paid for by the European Union. They are giving us support for a staff position to pack these packages that we are sending worldwide for RNA material. And the recipients on the other side don't have to pay to us, but to this EU project (which, by the way, is coordinated at the University of Marseille) an allowance for the transport costs.
Korinna Hennig: So you don't make any money with it.
Christian Drosten: We don't earn a cent. On the contrary, we pay a lot on it. But fortunately we are supported by public research funds from the European Union and recently also from the Bill Gates Foundation, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. However, these are research funds that are specifically for this purpose. We do not do any other research with them either; in principle, we are just packing our bags with them. So we don't earn a cent, we rather pay on top, because we didn't have these research funds in the beginning. We simply had to take it from petty cash, because otherwise nobody would have done anything.
And then it is so that in a test laboratory, of course, you basically also do billing. So these are medical services. If a patient is tested for any kind of virus in the laboratory, then it is the same as with other laboratory tests, then of course there is a cost unit, which is the Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians for publicly insured patients. There is a billing rate, and of course that goes to the laboratory. But it doesn't benefit me or my institute at all. We have no financial connection to it. And with private patients there is a private bill, which is then reimbursed by the private insurance. Some patients even have my name on the private bill because I am the head physician, and head physicians also write private bills for patients. But in my employment contract, it's not like I get that. It goes to the lab, and my salary has nothing to do with it. And there is a small salary component, I can really say that here, I am completely open about it, it depends on the private income, but I now pass it on again completely, but really down to the last cent, to the employees in the laboratory. So that I can really say, no matter who wants to accuse me of something, it's all completely wrong. I am happy to disclose all this. Anyone who wants to can check that.
Korinna Hennig: Transparency not only in research, but also in figures. Mr Drosten, let's look at current research, away from the accusations that have been made. The Imperial College in London has just published a new model, in other words an extrapolation or forecast, to put it very simply, of how infection figures and deaths will continue, what measures will be necessary, taking the UK and the USA as examples. There are huge potential mortality rates. It is estimated that more than one in four people over 60 years of age will end up in intensive care. How do you and your colleagues assess this calculation?
Christian Drosten: Yes, I can't say now how my colleagues judge them, because this study is so new that hardly anyone has had time to read and understand it completely. But I also consider it to be a very important study. It is probably also one of the studies that currently underpins the decisions taken by politicians in Great Britain. But here, too, the situation is now the same as here; we have consulted scientists for a long time, and these scientists have also tried to provide very differentiated data. At some point, though, a political decision was taken, and rightly so. We simply have to take political decisions now, where it is said that it is better to do something now than to miss any opportunity - and then we would be better off reassessing scientifically how we can take the necessary measures.
Detailed modelling study
So, and now to this study, assumptions are made - and that is always the case in these modelling studies. You can't simply calculate such a mathematical model according to natural constants, but you have to make assumptions for these models. And this is now simply a study in which a particularly fine-grained look was taken, that is, in which the mathematical model is particularly elaborate, and even the smallest details were programmed into it. But even in these smallest details there are assumptions, of course, and one must perhaps first bear these assumptions in mind.
For example, a mean incubation period of 5.1 days was assumed. I agree, that is certainly correct. It is assumed that infectivity in symptomatic patients starts 12 hours before the onset of symptoms. I would also agree with that. In fact, I would almost say that this is a bit too conservative. In fact, it probably starts the day before the onset of symptoms, but I can only say that based on laboratory data, not on transmission studies. (Whereby, the Munich transmission study suggests something like that.) I'm reading here, too, while I'm speaking, I had to write that out, I really only read this study this morning, and I can't say that I've grasped it completely in all details. It is assumed that two thirds of all cases are symptomatic. So one third of the cases don't notice the infection or at least don't take it seriously because it is so mild that they say it is nothing.
Korinna Hennig: So minimal throat irritation?
Christian Drosten: Yes, exactly. And that means that it is assumed that only two thirds of the cases, when they get sick, whether with or without a test, would go into home isolation. Whether voluntarily or after consulting a doctor and having a test, it doesn't matter. We are assuming an infectious mortality rate of 0.9%, which is not a case mortality rate, because now the unnoticed infected are also included, and then we can only say infectious mortality rate.
Korinna Hennig: But they are an important factor, the unnoticed infected.
Christian Drosten: Right, they are an important factor. But we don't know whether they really are a third, that's really an estimate here. You can see from this that such estimates are courageous, and they can be completely wrong, and they can have extreme effects at the end of a model calculation. That is always the problem with models; in some places you have to enter estimates. So you have a scientific study that looks extremely complicated, but then suddenly the important adjustment screws say: Yes, we asked an expert and he estimated that. That is to some extent the problem with such studies. But let's go over it further.
So two thirds of the cases are symptomatic, that's an estimate. Infectious mortality is 0.9 percent. In another study from the same group, recently also published, the estimate was even only 0.6 percent. These are roughly the figures we have always discussed here in the podcast, we have always said: Nah, the three or four percent, that is a special situation in an overburdened health care system and when tests are not available. They appreciate similar things here as we have always discussed here. Then they assume: a hospitalization rate - in other words, 4.4 percent of those infected go to hospital. That may already be the case.
Korinna Hennig: But that doesn't mean intensive care, but going to hospital in general.
Christian Drosten: Right. And then they estimate that one third of those who go to hospital have to be ventilated. I think that's a high number. But they also assume that, if you can convert that, that would be 1.32 percent of all infected persons. And that may well be, I would also make such estimates. And here it says again: This is based on an estimate by a professor in England.
Then it is assumed that 50 percent of those ventilated will die in the intensive care unit. That's a figure they come up with because of the age profile of England, the population, how big are the individual age groups? And here we assume that a very high proportion of old people are on the ventilators.
Many different parameters
I'm not sure how it would be in Germany. My friends, who are intensive care physicians and have ventilated such illnesses in large numbers, tell me that they would appreciate being in Germany - there are also other factors involved, we have a very high level of competence in intensive care medicine in Germany, for example, and that also counts, because this ventilation is not so easy to perform, you have to be well versed in it. But my colleagues whom I ask, they tell me that they assume that in Germany 30 or 40 per cent would die in the intensive care unit and not 50 per cent. I wonder if that's all there is to it. Who knows. I can only give you an idea.
And then there are various other parameters that you can think of here. Then there are also considerations such as household quarantine. So when it is said that there is a case, now the whole household - and that is usually the whole family - must stay at home for 14 days. According to the study, only 50% of households would comply with this. I have to say that I find that a steep assumption. So if you know that there is a case and the health authority says that everyone has to stay at home now, that you simply do not do that - I do not believe that half of them would simply not do that. I can't imagine that.
Korinna Hennig: You have just made a small comparison with the deaths, citing your colleagues. To what extent do you think that, seen as a whole - it is of course difficult to generalize, but nevertheless you might look at it from above - it is transferable to Germany? This study is about Great Britain and the USA.
Christian Drosten: Right. So I'm going to say this here in advance because the numbers that come out at the back are serious, you simply have to say: In short, I think that this is quite transferable. I believe that the English population is not so much different from ours. There are some differences in the health system. I think we have a very good and high ventilation capacity and a high level of professionalism, high skill levels of our intensive care doctors. And what is also being discussed here now are intervention measures that are not the same as ours. For example, the question now is, what could be achieved? A combination of case isolation, that is to say, someone who is positive must stay at home, and home quarantine, that is to say, his whole family must also stay at home, for 14 days, and a distancing of those over 70. That is to say that they are told not to meet, only to stay at home and so on. But there is no closing of schools and nothing else, only these measures, that is, distancing the over-70s. Everyone else goes on living as before. Everyone goes to work normally, but cases are found and isolated, and their families go into home quarantine. Under these conditions, you could expect to have eight times as many cases to ventilate as you can ventilate. In other words, we would have an Italian situation. So the situation that is now being discussed, that patients cannot be ventilated and have to be selected from among the patients requiring difficult ventilation, which patient is now being ventilated? Which one has the best chance of also benefiting from ventilation and ultimately leaving the hospital alive? So this triage consideration.
Korinna Hennig: So it is no longer controllable, actually with a reasonable care of the patients! This is a very important point, because many of our listeners have e-mailed us such a scenario with all due caution and asked us: But wouldn't it actually make sense to completely isolate the older patients and let the others develop herd immunity in the meantime? But these figures then clearly speak against it.
Christian Drosten: Right. So they say, you can forget it. That you let life go on as before, only the infected and their families are kept together at home. And the old people in the population, they are taken care of in principle, but they are not supposed to leave the house - and that for three months, by the way, is the assumption here. That leads nowhere, unless you want to accept that you will then have the same situation as in Italy. And I believe that none of us want to accept that.
And then, of course, it goes on. And here is the message that of course more can be done, and that perhaps corresponds roughly to what we are already doing here in Germany. Of course, we must continue to isolate ourselves from the fall. So anyone who is infected should stay at home, regardless of whether they have been diagnosed or not. Soon the influenza season will end. Now you can almost soon say: Whoever has these symptoms should consider himself infected.
Korinna Hennig: So it's best already with throat irritation.
Christian Drosten: Yes. And of course he should look for diagnostics, but he should assume that he has it and then stay at home. And in addition social distancing in the whole population, not only in the high age groups, but everywhere, and we are already doing that in principle. It is not yet the case that there is a curfew, but rather that people are saying that homework should be done everywhere, wherever possible, and so on. And then, of course, with the closure of the school, we now have a lot of people who are at home because of the children and so on, so that is a further component. And then there is a further component, either the household quarantine, which means that here too the case is isolated and the whole household is isolated. And in principle we have that now too, but we have a more detailed implementation. For the time being, then, it is still the case that the Health Office says that we are doing contact categories and that high-risk contacts must stay at home. But of course contacts with households are high-risk contacts.
Korinna Hennig: So within the household, the family, you mean now.
Christian Drosten: Yes, exactly, so that this is already implemented. And as an alternative, and this is interesting that this is being discussed here from this British perspective as an alternative: graduation from school and university.
Korinna Hennig: But over a long period of time, if I read that correctly.
Christian Drosten: Over five months. And here you can see how the struggle to incorporate political decision-making options into such scientific studies has been going on. And where the question is asked, do we really have to close schools and universities? Can we calculate that separately? And then, at the end of the day, the result is that with both options, i.e. with or without school closure, we can first delay the infections, i.e. flatten this curve, as has been said. However, school and university closure is much more efficient. And there is something resonating in the discussion of this article - it is true that scientific articles of this kind consist of a hard part of results and then a final part of discussions - and sometimes you can read things through between the lines. And here it is said between the lines that the end of school is much more efficient than the additional budgetary quarantine alone. But now we know that the quarantine is already in place and has already been implemented. What this means is that the issue of whether we need the end of school is being discussed here in a hidden manner. Yes or no? And then, of course, the arguments are just as differentiated and cautious, as scientists in Germany did last week. Because, of course, we know that, firstly, the data situation is a bit unclear. And secondly, it has serious economic consequences. And thirdly, it is perhaps not being kept up completely. What we are already seeing at the moment is that the pupils are actually walking around again and doing something else.
On-Off mechanism
So in this publication at the end it is said in principle that if you take all these things and make it clear that perhaps all these things will not be kept up, then perhaps you will have to go all the way to the end of school, that is the hidden message in it.
And then there's something that I think is even more important: They say you really have to stick it out for five months. And that's an extremely long time, it's really hard to keep it up. And in addition, they say that if you then let go of these measures, if you then simply take it all back again after these five months, the infection will come back, and it will be a winter wave. That is something that we absolutely must avoid, because then we would not have gained much. Then we would only have postponed the problem until winter. Of course, a postponement is of course a great gain if we have found something in the time until then, a new way of dealing with it, and can then solve the problem in another way.
And because this is a dilemma, because it looks as if there is now no other intervention with all the normal measures, i.e. a drug or a vaccine, something else is then played out. Namely, what would actually happen if we were to say that all these combined measures were to be taken for a time. And then you see that the cases of illness fall below a certain level, and then you let the measures go. Then everyone would be allowed to live as before and go to school. And then when the cases have risen to a certain level again, then you switch it on again and so on. Then you always observe the cases that are in intensive care units. You count them, because they are easy to report and easy to count. And you use this criterion to switch the system on and off. So you always have holiday periods and work breaks with normal life.
Of course, in the end this is something you play through theoretically - but it's worth thinking about: Could you do something like that? And what comes out is: You could do that. This would allow us to keep the number of cases in a low range. And you could then also take care of all these patients. But you would have to keep it up for two years. And that is of course unthinkable. And at the end of the day, the message of this study is that we need something else, we have to do something.
Ease vaccine regulations
Well, we can certainly make it, and I see it the same way for Germany. We can now definitely manage to get the ball rolling and reduce the number of cases over the next few months, in other words in the early summer months, to such an extent that we can take care of all patients and not end up in this situation of an overstretched health care system, where case mortality rises because those who need it can no longer be ventilated.
We can do that, but we also have to find something else. We need to find a vaccine or some medicine that could be given to the elderly. We do not, of course, have to provide the whole population with anything, but at least the risk groups and especially the elderly people, something must be done for them now. I believe that we really do have to do something about this - that is my personal opinion, and many people, including scientists, will see it differently from my own - but I really must say that I have been dealing with these matters very intensively over the last few days, because I have been asked by politicians to give answers that I cannot give myself, and I have been looking at figures back and forth and calculating all over again:
And for me, my personal conclusion is really, if we want to make it all work as a society, in a way that we really don't want to accept an increased death rate in the elderly population, then we probably have to override regulatory things in terms of vaccines. And look, where can we conjure up a vaccine that is already relatively well developed, that has perhaps already been clinically tested? No vaccine has been clinically tested for this new virus, but vaccines have been tested for the old SARS virus. One would have to look there now, what is there actually? What data is actually available from back then? And then we have to consider how we can manage to facilitate regulatory processes in this exceptional situation for a special group in the population.
Korinna Hennig: So to loosen the regulations a little bit with regard to: If necessary, we also accept a small risk that has not yet been completely tested for side effects, for example.
Christian Drosten: Yes. And for such a risk the state would then also have to be liable. And these are all very difficult decisions and considerations, because in the end it would affect many people, and all of this is not thought through in a pure and simple way - I'm just going to say this into the microphone. But I think we must now start this thinking process among experts in science to think about unusual options, if we believe in these modelling figures. And I do believe in these numbers. Well, I always have my reservations about such modelling because, as I said earlier, rough assumptions are always made. So you have a highly complex system, but then suddenly there's a very rough screw on it somewhere, and somebody just comes along and turns it around, just like he says. While other things, the very fine gears - they all adjust themselves mutually. And you can be really sceptical about that.
But it must also be said that I no longer believe that these epidemiological models make such gross errors as they did 15 years ago or 20 years ago, when it was said that the whole of England would get BSE in the next few months, and stories like that. These were errors that were also made with the calculations and with the assumptions, and that did not happen. That also cast a somewhat negative light on the model calculations and epidemiological modelling. But so much time has now passed and so much has been learned that we, as scientists, simply have to say that we take it seriously. And if we take it seriously... I think this study is one of the best studies available so far. And it's not only based on the USA, but also on England, a country that is very similar to us. And the outlook is really desperate. It's really bad what you read at the end of the day from this study and we have to sit down and talk to each other about possibilities.
Korinna Hennig: But you have already pointed out a potential path - at least one on which one can think further. So there are many points of reference and a lot of homework for political decision-makers - and of course for you as a researcher when it comes to drug research.
Mr. Drosten, thank you very much for today. We will continue to talk about your research results from the Charité, as far as they are ready for discussion - and we will talk again tomorrow.
Christian Drosten: Gladly. See you tomorrow.
Translated & reblogged Version - Original here