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Review
. 2023 Jul 24;17(1):68.
doi: 10.1186/s40246-023-00515-2.

COVID-19 annual update: a narrative review

Michela Biancolella #  1 , Vito Luigi Colona #  2 , Lucio Luzzatto #  3   4 , Jessica Lee Watt  5 , Giorgio Mattiuz  4 , Silvestro G Conticello  6   7 , Naftali Kaminski  8 , Ruty Mehrian-Shai  9 , Albert I Ko  10   11 , Gregg S Gonsalves  12 , Vasilis Vasiliou  13 , Giuseppe Novelli #  14   15   16 , Juergen K V Reichardt #  17
Affiliations
Review

COVID-19 annual update: a narrative review

Michela Biancolella et al. Hum Genomics. .

Abstract

Three and a half years after the pandemic outbreak, now that WHO has formally declared that the emergency is over, COVID-19 is still a significant global issue. Here, we focus on recent developments in genetic and genomic research on COVID-19, and we give an outlook on state-of-the-art therapeutical approaches, as the pandemic is gradually transitioning to an endemic situation. The sequencing and characterization of rare alleles in different populations has made it possible to identify numerous genes that affect either susceptibility to COVID-19 or the severity of the disease. These findings provide a beginning to new avenues and pan-ethnic therapeutic approaches, as well as to potential genetic screening protocols. The causative virus, SARS-CoV-2, is still in the spotlight, but novel threatening virus could appear anywhere at any time. Therefore, continued vigilance and further research is warranted. We also note emphatically that to prevent future pandemics and other world-wide health crises, it is imperative to capitalize on what we have learnt from COVID-19: specifically, regarding its origins, the world's response, and insufficient preparedness. This requires unprecedented international collaboration and timely data sharing for the coordination of effective response and the rapid implementation of containment measures.

Keywords: COVID-19; Coronavirus; Pandemic; Public health; SARS-CoV-2; Susceptibility genes; Therapy; Vaccines; Variants.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Temporal appearance of the SARS-CoV-2 strains. (Left) Each dot represents a sequenced genome at a given time point. Connecting lines indicate the evolutionary relationship among strains. The labels indicate the emerging lineages (nomenclature from nexstrain.org). (Right) Frequencies of sequenced genomes across continents (modified from nextstrain.org)
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Amino acid change in SARS-CoV-2 evolution. Distribution of amino acid changes detected in viral genes, indicated in color (y axis). The number of aa changes that affect the same codon is reported on x axis (generated by nextstrain.org)
Fig. 3
Fig. 3
Chromosome ideogram representing the location of genes of interest investigated for a role in defining susceptibility to SARS-CoV-2 infection or COVID-19 severity (generated by visualization.ritchielab.org). For each gene, the involved pathways or mechanisms have been reported as per the legend
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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