Ummah should be reunited to cope with COVID-19: Pakistani scholar
“This is the time for us to show solidarity that we are Ummah and our differences do not lead to any major distinction at this point of time between us. We have to work together and to help each other to defeat COVID-19 in the Islamic world,” The director of International Center for Chemical and Biological Sciences (ICCBS) at the University of Karachi in Pakistan Muhammad Iqbal Choudhary said in an interview with the MSTF.
MSTF Media reports:
Choudhary called the outbreak of COVID-19 as a good opportunity for Muslim countries to start developing the research infrastructure.
“This is a long way to go because it is not the only disease and may be more pandemics appears in the future. This is the time that pandemics come and perhaps even more often than it happened in the past,” he lamented.
“Also we should make sure that our health care system does not overwhelm. That is why I think we need to think about developing our capacity as Muslim Ummah,” he said.
“Right now prevention and making sure that people are not infecting each other seems to be the most appropriate action to take,” he added.
Vaccine development take six to nine months
Elsewhere in his remarks, Choudhary noted that there are 35 laboratories in the world who are working on developing a vaccine.
“The Vaccine development takes six to nine months before it becomes available due to long experiments to make sure that there is no adverse effect on the human being,” he explained.
“I think that it would not be available before September that it would be available for the public. Hence the only way is prevention,” he said.
ICCBS works on COVID-19, getting ready for future pandemics
He explained the ICCBS saying that the center has two wings: H.E.J. Research Institute of Chemistry and the Panjwani Center for Molecular Medicine and Drug Research (PCMD).
Right now the ICCBS conducting many experiments at the virology center to set new diagnostic facilities for national diagnosis since there is a large demand for diagnosis and the center is developing new and low-cost kits for diagnosis, he added.
In the center, we are in the process of identifying compounds that are active against some of the key proteins of COVID-19. We are in the process of understanding whether certain compounds getting locked these proteins which are so vital in the life cycle of these viruses.
What we are getting out is that there are certain plans which are only reported to be active against other species of Coronavirus. We should take it into consideration that coronavirus is a big family of viruses and there are some works that have been conducted in the last fifteen years in which certain medicine plans are found to be active.
“We have recently procured these plans and we are trying to understand whether these plans can be used as antiviral therapy. There are many projects that we are currently engaged and of course, the research center can do very good work but it takes time. At least we can prepare ourselves for future problems and pandemics,” he explained.
“Therefore I salute medical staff, pray for them and hope they will be successful soon and will help other Muslim countries,” he concluded.
