Scientists responded to the two thousand and three outbreak by designing amoe that inhibits a protein integral to corona virous replication. But infections soon petered out, and after the last cases of sars were reported in two thousand and four, fizer and other companies working on sars drugs shelved their programms. As u n c verologist timothy shehan says, it's hard to convince a company to make a drug against something that doesn't exist.
Despite warnings, and a number of close calls, drugmakers failed to develop and stockpile drugs to fight a viral pandemic. Now, in the wake of SARS-CoV-2, they are pledging not to make the same mistake again.
Around the world, researchers are racing to develop drugs to target COVID-19, but also broad-spectrum antivirals that could be used to treat future viral threats.
This is an audio version of our feature: The race for antiviral drugs to beat COVID — and the next pandemic
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