On Monday, Israel's Defence Minister Naftali Bennett announced that the nation's defence biological research institute has achieved success in the development of a key coronavirus antibody.
As per a report by FirstPost, Defence Minister Naftali Bennett said in a statement the “monoclonal neutralising antibody” developed at the Israel Institute for Biological Research (IIBR) “can neutralise it (the disease-causing coronavirus) inside carriers’ bodies.”
The statement added that Bennett visited the IIBR on Monday where he was briefed “on a significant breakthrough in finding an antidote for the coronavirus”.
Monoclonal antibodies are cloned from a single recovered cell. Thus, they are much easier to create and use, as opposed to polyclonal antibodies which will have to be derived from multiple cells.
According to Reuters, the IIBR has been leading Israeli efforts to develop a treatment and vaccine for the coronavirus, including the testing of blood from those who recovered from COVID-19.
World leaders on Monday pledged billions of euros for research to find a vaccine against coronavirus. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres during a video-conference summit said that the 7.5 billion euros (USD 8.2 billion) target being sought to help find a vaccine.
People in many countries across the globe, and notably in Europe this week, are cautiously returning to work but authorities remain wary of the second wave of infections, and a vaccine is the only real golden bullet to allow something like normal life to resume.
