Tag Archives: common cold unit

By Kate Murphy, New York Times

In an age of masking, compulsive hand sanitizing and plexiglass dividers, it seems inconceivable that for more than 40 years people enthusiastically signed up — and were often put on a waiting list — to have respiratory viruses, including coronaviruses, dripped into their noses.

They were volunteers at the Common Cold Unit, set up in 1946 by the British government’s Medical Research Council…

…aim of the study was to identify the lowest amount of virus to safely and reliably infect someone, so researchers can later easily test the efficacy of vaccines or antivirals on future challenge trial volunteers. “Of course, in doing that, you learn a lot about the actual disease, which indeed we have,” said Dr. Andrew Catchpole, chief scientific officer at hVIVO, a British clinical and laboratory services company that partnered with Imperial College London to conduct Britain’s Covid-19 challenge study….

Link here for the full article