Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Infection and Rapid Transmission of SARS-CoV-2 in Ferrets

2020; Cell Press; Volume: 27; Issue: 5 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1016/j.chom.2020.03.023

1934-6069

Young‐Il Kim, Seong-Gyu Kim, Se-Mi Kim, Eun-Ha Kim, Su-Jin Park, Kwang-Min Yu, Jae-Hyung Chang, Eun Ji Kim, Seung‐Hun Lee, Mark Anthony B. Casel, Jihye Um, Min‐Suk Song, Hye Won Jeong, Van Dam Lai, Yeonjae Kim, Bum Sik Chin, Jun-Sun Park, Ki-Hyun Chung, Suan-Sin Foo, Haryoung Poo, In-Pil Mo, Ok-Jun Lee, Richard J. Webby, Jae U. Jung, Young Ki Choi,

COVID-19 Clinical Research Studies

The outbreak of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) emerged in China and rapidly spread worldwide. To prevent SARS-CoV-2 dissemination, understanding the in vivo characteristics of SARS-CoV-2 is a high priority. We report a ferret model of SARS-CoV-2 infection and transmission that recapitulates aspects of human disease. SARS-CoV-2-infected ferrets exhibit elevated body temperatures and virus replication. Although fatalities were not observed, SARS-CoV-2-infected ferrets shed virus in nasal washes, saliva, urine, and feces up to 8 days post-infection. At 2 days post-contact, SARS-CoV-2 was detected in all naive direct contact ferrets. Furthermore, a few naive indirect contact ferrets were positive for viral RNA, suggesting airborne transmission. Viral antigens were detected in nasal turbinate, trachea, lungs, and intestine with acute bronchiolitis present in infected lungs. Thus, ferrets represent an infection and transmission animal model of COVID-19 that may facilitate development of SARS-CoV-2 therapeutics and vaccines.