COVID-19

Interview with Lhousseine Touqui, Research Director for respiratory infectious diseases at the Institut Pasteur

Can you tell us a bit about your research?

I mainly work on cystic fibrosis, a genetic disorder characterized by chronic and often incurable lung infections. My goal is to identify the mechanisms involved in these infections, in order to develop treatment options that can help patients with this disorder combat the infections. More recently, I've been working on a project related to COVID-19, in collaboration with colleagues from Inserm and Saint-Antoine and Saint-Joseph Paris Hospitals. The idea is to understand the respiratory aggravating factors of COVID-19 using particular inflammation biomarkers (which have yet to be studied), in order to predict the disease's evolution and develop treatment strategies.

What does this COVID-19 project mean for you?

这个项目让我“贡献一个赌注ter understanding” of the disease, with two main focuses. Firstly, understanding the mechanisms that predispose patients to a worse survival prognosis. Secondly, understanding how to block these mechanisms, which would help combat the COVID-19 virus, and possibly help combat other viruses from the same family that could lead to epidemics in the future. This project also combines basic research and clinical research, as we're studying samples from COVID-19 patients, which aren't always easy for researchers to obtain. This study raises important ethical questions that need to be factored. Patients must give their consent before we can use their samples or publish any results from them in specialized journals. The samples are also potentially dangerous (since they contain viruses), which requires us to impose more stringent measures related to their use (strict health and safety standards) as well as their traceability (labeling and storage).There are also intellectual property issues (potential patents) tied to the results and their use in treatment.

What does a group like Air Liquide bring to you?

The support of the Air Liquide Group, through its Foundation, is immensely important to the Institut Pasteur, as it provides funding for research on lung conditions, which is my team's specialty. In addition, the Air Liquide Foundation has been highly responsive and effective during the current health crisis: our COVID-19 research project was accepted in just three weeks! That's exceptional, since other funding bodies can take as long as several months.