15 July 2020

A new report by MedCity showcases King’s Health Partners’ and other key institutions’ rapid response to COVID-19. 

Due to the global impact of COVID-19, the work of the life sciences sector has never been more important and its efforts have been rightly praised and valued across the world. London’s contribution to the fight against the pandemic has been particularly high profile, and its life sciences sector has come together to refocus efforts and resources in an unprecedented and impressive way.

King’s Health Partners has helped to drive these efforts with its strengths in collaboration and capacity, supporting wider collaborations to be forged across London, such as the London COVID-19 Alliance.

Now, a new report by MedCity, the cluster organisation for London and the Greater South East of England life sciences sector, alongside the three London Academic Health Sciences Centres (AHSCs): King’s Health Partners; Imperial College AHSC and UCL Partners has shone a light on the work that has been going on to tackle COVID-19. MedCity has brought together even more institutions and partners across London, including Queen Mary University of London, Government and agencies, to tackle COVID-19, together. 

Unleashing Innovation London Life Science’s Sector: The Fight Against COVID-19 shares some key examples of the world-leading science taking place across London. We take a look at examples from across our partnership featured in the report:

Shipping container testing labs

OpenCell.bio King’s College London, an organisation that provides early stage bio start-ups with affordable space, and Opentrons Labworks, have collaborated to develop a low-cost, rapidly deployable COVID-19 testing lab inside shipping containers. This is the first fully functioning lab that can be deployed anywhere in the world for COVID-19 testing. It can process 2,400 tests per day, using low-cost liquid handling robots to detect the presence of the virus.

Symptom Tracker App

Recruiting more than 3.6 million people across the UK, the COVID-19 symptom tracker app, developed by King’s College London, aims to identify how fast the virus is spreading in each area of the country, the highest risk areas, and who is most at risk. The App has already shown some major insights, including identifying loss of smell or taste as a significant symptom of COVID-19 and that symptoms such as fever, fatigue and anosmia have genetic influences. It’s also supported the development of AI diagnostic to predict COVID-19 without testing, based on symptoms.

Landmark plasma trial

Dr Manu Shankar-Hari, a consultant in intensive care medicine at Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust, along with experts from NHS Blood and Transplant and the University of Cambridge, are co-leading a trial on a promising new blood plasma treatment for COVID-19. The treatment involves blood plasma donations from patients who have recovered from COVID-19 for those who are severely ill with COVID-19. The plasma is transfused into COVID-19 patients whose bodies aren’t producing enough of their own antibodies against the virus – to support the patients fighting the disease. A patient from Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust was the first to receive this treatment. 

Commenting on the trial, Prof Sir Robert Lechler, Executive Director of King’s Health Partners and Senior Vice President and Provost (Health) at King’s College London, said:

Convalescent plasma is a promising treatment that could help patients who aren’t producing enough antibodies to curb the disease. This trial will help us understand whether the treatment should be used more widely to treat COVID-19.

Trial on T-cells

It’s been discovered that those with the most severe form of COVID-19 have extremely low numbers of immune cells, also known as T-cells, with clear infection from the body. This finding has prompted research into whether a drug, known to boost T-cell numbers, can aid patients’ recovery. Scientists from the Francis Crick Institute, King’s College London, and Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust are conducting a trial to evaluable whether a drug called interleukin 7 can aid patients who are the most seriously ill with COVID-19.

Read MedCity’s report Unleashing Innovation London Life Science’s Sector: The Fight Against COVID-19.

Find the latest news on how King’s Health Partners continues to support the fight against coronavirus.