On Sep. 27, the Ho Leung Ho Lee Foundation Forum & Photo Exhibition 2020 was held in Lotus Pond Grand Hotel, Wuhan. Prof. Jin Meilin of HZAU, awarded the Prize for Progress in Science and Technology from the Foundation, was invited to deliver a speech on “the tracing and control of COVID-19”.

Since the outbreak of the virus, HZAU has been actively participating in the R&D of anti-epidemic treatment. Prof. Jin gave a detailed report on the whole process of the “battle” in which she has also been racing against the coronavirus in her own field in Wuhan, once the epicenter of the outbreak. Jin and her team started with tracing the virus and finding methods in epidemiology to contain the virus. They have monitored and screened the booths in Wuhan Huanan Seafood Market, where the outbreak was first documented, and the wild animals, domestic animals and pets in the counties and cities near Wuhan.

Focusing on epidemiological studies of cats and dogs in close contact with patients, she was the first to detect cats’ susceptibility to the coronavirus, providing valuable data for blocking the chain of transmission. Jin, together with her team, took the lead in developing the novel coronavirus antibody testing for both humans and mammals, which has increased the sensitivity by 100 times compared with colloidal gold test strips. She has also solved numerous critical problems by establishing animal models for the COVID-19, such as the difficulty in drug screening, the lack of laboratory animals for vaccine testing, and the low testing sensitivity.

The Ho Leung Ho Lee Foundation was established in Hong Kong in 1994. It is dedicated to motivating the Chinese scientists and engineers with outstanding achievements to promote the innovation and development of China’s science and technology. So far, there are 7 professors from HZAU winning the award from the Foundation.

Source: http://m.hzau.edu.cn/article/13485
Translated by: Liu Nianyi
Supervised by: Pan Buhan