Intranasal exposure of African green monkeys to SARS-CoV-2 results in acute phase pneumonia with shedding and lung injury still present in the early convalescence phase

Abstract

We recently reported the development of the first African green monkey (AGM) model for COVID-19 based on a combined liquid intranasal (i.n.) and intratracheal (i.t.) exposure to severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). Here, we followed up on this work by assessing an i.n. particle only route of exposure using the LMA mucosal atomization device (MAD). Six AGMs were infected with SARS-CoV-2; three animals were euthanized near the peak stage of virus replication (day 5) and three animals were euthanized during the early convalescence period (day 34). All six AGMs supported robust SARS-CoV-2 replication and developed respiratory disease. Evidence of coagulation dysfunction as noted by a transient increases in aPTT and circulating levels of fibrinogen was observed in all AGMs. The level of SARS-CoV-2 replication and lung pathology was not quite as pronounced as previously reported with AGMs exposed by the combined i.n. and i.t. routes; however, SARS-CoV-2 RNA was detected in nasal swabs of some animals as late as day 15 and rectal swabs as late as day 28 after virus challenge. Of particular importance to this study, all three AGMs that were followed until the early convalescence stage of COVID-19 showed substantial lung pathology at necropsy as evidenced by multifocal chronic interstitial pneumonia and increased collagen deposition in alveolar walls despite the absence of detectable SARS-CoV-2 in any of the lungs of these animals. These findings are consistent with human COVID-19 further demonstrating that the AGM faithfully reproduces the human condition.

Possible Role of Pets, Wild and Domestic Animals in the Transmission of Covid-19 to Humans

“…Other recent studies have suggested rhesus macaque as potential laboratory animal model for carrying out SARS-CoV-2 studies due to viral shedding, signs and symptoms similar to humans (Yu et al 2020;Munster et al 2020;Ying et al 2020). Similar observations of infection after inoculation of virus have been reported in African green monkeys used to study COVID-19 infection (Cross et al 2020).…”

“…Thus, the persons who work on wildlife are in close contact with such animals and/or work for wildlife management and are in close contact with wildlife species, should follow stringent preventive measures to avoid the spread of the virus. SARS-CoV-2 has been detected rarely from other animal species including rhesus macaques, African green monkeys and Egyptian fruit bats; this highlights the possibility of cross-species transmission of SARS-CoV-2 (Schlottau et al 2020;Yu et al 2020;Munster et al 2020;Cross et al 2020). A latest study from the Netherlands investigated on the spread of SARS-CoV-2 virus from mink back to humans working on the mink farm.…”

Synthetic Multiantigen MVA Vaccine COH04S1 Protects Against SARS-CoV-2 in Syrian Hamsters and Non-Human Primates

“…NHP represent a mild COVID-19 disease model that is widely used to bolster preclinical SARS-CoV-2 vaccine efficacy against upper and lower respiratory tract infection in an animal species that is more closely related to humans [49][50][51][52][53][54][55][56] . We used the African green monkey NHP model to assess COH04S1 vaccine protection against SARS-CoV-2 by 2D and 1D vaccination regimens, referred to as COH04S1-2D and COH04S1-1D, respectively.…”

A framework for predicting potential host ranges of pathogenic viruses based on receptor ortholog analysis

“…3B). Besides, we regarded ACE2 of Rhinolophus sinicus, Chlorocebus sabaeus, and Macaca fascicularis as permissive, and regarded Callithrix jacchus as non-permissive orthologs respectively, as published experimental evidence proved that ACE2 of R. sinicus could mediate SARS-CoV-2 entry into HeLa cells (Zhou et al, 2020), Chlorocebus sabaeus (Cross et al, 2020), and Macaca fascicularis(S. were susceptible to SARS-CoV-2 infection, and yet C. jacchus was not susceptible to SARS-CoV-2 infection(S. Lu et al, 2020).…”