NC Healthcare Coverage Blog

Curing the common cold may soon become a reality for researchers. On February 12, some researchers claimed that they have decoded the genomes of the 99 strains of the common cold virus. They have also established a catalog of the cold virus’ weaknesses.

The common cold has resisted treatment in the past because of the rhinovirus. This virus causes most colds, and it has so many strains that it is extremely difficult for any drug or vaccine to conquer it.

Another obstruction to drug advancement is that colds in general are usually only a minor inconvenience, which causes people to be hesitant to pay for expensive medicines to combat them. In the past, it has been unlikely for the Food and Drug Administration to give the green light for a drug that has any negative consequences for such a minor disease, and pharmaceutical companies haven’t shown a lot of enthusiasm for investing in discovering new treatments.

New understanding of the rhinovirus’ evolutionary action from a research team conducted by Dr. Claire Fraser-Liggett, a top genome researcher at the University of Maryland, and Dr. Ann Palmenberg, a cold virologist from the University of Wisconsin, may have finally put an end to this inefficient pattern. The results were published online in the February 12 issue of journal Science.

Physicians who are experts on asthma are especially interested in these new findings. About half of all asthma attacks are believed to be set off by rhinoviruses. An asthma expert from the University of Arizona, claims that it should now be possible to indicate what specific part contains viruses that are most related to asthma patients.

Dr. Kathryn Miller, another asthma expert at the Vanderbilt Children’s Hospital in Nashville, said that the new discovery “is a groundbreaking study of major significance to the scientific world.” He said that people who are at substantial risk from rhinoviruses, like children with asthma or adults with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, would profit immensely from new medicine, therefore the pharmaceutical industry should be intensely interested. But according to Dr. Glenn Tillotson, an expert in antiviral drugs at Viropharma in Exton, Pa., it may be more difficult to spark the industry’s interest for new common cold treatments than it is for the researchers and physicians.