After the Second Plenary Session of the Fifth Session of the 13th National People's Congress, the "Minister's Channel" interview activity was held, and some heads of relevant ministries and commissions of the State Council who attended the meeting were invited to be interviewed through online video.
Guangming Daily reporter: Since the outbreak of the new crown pneumonia epidemic, the Ministry of Science and Technology has actively organized scientific researchers to carry out scientific research, providing important scientific and technological guarantees for the lives and health of the people.
Excuse me, how is the recent progress in tackling key issues, and what are the next steps?
Wang Zhigang, Minister of Science and Technology: One of the important factors in China's successful control of the epidemic is technology.
On the afternoon of March 2, 2020, when General Secretary Xi Jinping inspected the joint prevention and control scientific research team of the State Council, he proposed that the epidemic prevention and control should seek answers and methods from science.
We have always adhered to five major directions to carry out scientific research, including vaccines, drugs, testing, animal models and scientific traceability.
Wang Zhigang: In terms of vaccines, 3 inactivated vaccines and 1 adenovirus vector vaccine were released with conditions, and this year, another recombinant protein vaccine was released with conditions.
There are also two technical routes that have made positive progress. One is the mRNA vaccine, which has entered the third phase of clinical trials; the other is the DNA vaccine, which has also entered the third phase of clinical trials.
This is an important achievement achieved by the majority of scientific researchers with their level, integrity, dedication and perseverance.
Wang Zhigang: In terms of drug research and development, one neutralizing antibody drug has been marketed with conditions, and three small molecule drugs have entered Phase III clinical trials.
In addition, there are some neutralizing antibody drugs, small molecule drugs, and traditional Chinese medicines, which are all under active research and development, showing good prospects.
Now the virus mutates a lot, it is Omicron for a while, and Delta for a while. Can there be some broad-spectrum drugs to deal with the coronavirus or the new coronavirus?
is also actively developing.
In addition, we can only get vaccinated by injection now. Can we get vaccinated by nasal spray or inhalation?
This work is also under study and is now well advanced.
Wang Zhigang: In terms of testing, sample testing can be completed within 30 minutes at the fastest. An integrated testing system can test 200,000 samples a day, greatly improving the capability.
Wang Zhigang: In terms of the work of the Ministry of Science and Technology, we are the leader of the scientific research team.
In this fight against the epidemic, technology must play its due role.
The more scientific and technological means and methods, the richer, more targeted and more scientific our prevention and control plans will be.
At the same time, we are still doing one thing, which is to accumulate some means, tools and products in science and technology.
For example, when SARS came out in 2003, it was not clear what was going on for a long time.
After the new coronary pneumonia came out, the virus gene map was known in 7 days, and the detection reagent was taken out in another 7 days.
When the new crown pneumonia epidemic is over, what will we leave behind?
What remains is how to do the usual epidemic prevention, how to timely and effectively switch the ability and mechanism when the epidemic breaks out, and leave a group of teams, technologies, platforms and international partners.
All these will make the toolbox of scientific and technological anti-epidemic means and methods more abundant when we encounter major infectious diseases that endanger people's health in the future.
Please don't worry about this.
(Organized according to web text live broadcast)