Role of the Laboratory in the Outbreak, Spread, Prevention and Control of Covid-19 Pandemic in Nigeria

Abstract

Coronavirus disease 2019, abbreviated to COVID-19, is the latest biological hazard to assume the relevance of insidious worldwide threat. The responsible pathogen is a virus belonging to the Coronaviridae family, finally defined as “severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2” (SARS-CoV-2) for high sequence identity (i.e. up to 80%) with the homologous virus which caused the SARS outbreak in 2003 (i.e. SARS-CoV). At the time of writing this article, SARS-CoV-2 has already infected over 115,000 people in more than 115 different countries, causing nearly 4000 related deaths. Structural analysis shows that SARS-CoV-2 probably derives from a bat SARS-like coronavirus, which has been then transmitted to humans after emergence of mutations in the spike glycoprotein (protein S) and nucleocapsid N protein. The mutation that occurred in the former protein is especially important, whereby viral spike glycoprotein mediates the entrance of the virus into the cell through cell receptor binding and membrane fusion. On the other hand, the N protein regulates the process of viral replication, thus influencing transcription and assembly. Altogether, mutations in these two proteins would then explain the unique characteristics of SARS-CoV-2 compared to the original SARS-CoV, i.e. enhanced infectious potency in humans, combined with relatively mitigated pathogenicity.