Repurposing drugs might help fight this pandemic

In mid-February, a California woman with chronic health problems tested positive for coronavirus. She hadn’t traveled overseas, nor had she come into contact with anyone who had it.

When Nevan Krogan caught wind of the case, he was immediately concerned. It was the first known case of community spread in the US. “I realized at that point, this is going to be everywhere. This is everywhere,” says Krogan.

As a molecular biologist at the University of California, San Francisco, Krogan runs a lab that studies how genes of diseases interact with proteins in the human body. At the time, he only had two full-time staff scientists investigating SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes covid-19. He quickly went into the lab, gathered everyone, and told them to drop what they were doing and focus on studying the new coronavirus.