The COVID-19 Experience

Nothing in my lifetime has emphasized the importance of medical research as much as the COVID-19 pandemic. Molecular biology, virology, epidemiology and acute medical care have all played an important role in helping us understand and develop strategies to mitigate its effects. Certainly as we all wait for a possible vaccine, this is clearly an opportunity for science to come to the rescue and get the world back rotating on its axis. What has also become abundantly clear is the anti- intellectual movement that has gained steam in the US and spilled over to other countries can do real harm. Instead of listening to the best forecasts of qualified medical experts, many political leaders have chosen strategies that have accelerated mortality rates and viral spread. Given the current state of affairs, with second waves occurring in many areas and the threat of second waves seemingly ever present, these economy first approaches may ultimately backfire, leaving the virus with us in the near future.  

The pandemic has also made me rethink the importance of aging research. For years, I have emphasized that aging is the biggest risk factor for a wide range of chronic diseases and that by slowing aging, it will be possible to prevent disease onset and dramatically improve life quality in later years. Chronic diseases are of course still with us and will continue to be the biggest driver or healthcare costs over the long-term. However, aging is also the biggest risk factor for complications from COVID-19 leading to mortality (and this is true for influenza and many other acute infections. Therefore, the pandemic has re-emphasized the importance of interventions that delay or reverse biological aging, allowing are bodies to respond to infections in a more youthful manner. Now we need aging research and human interventions more than ever.  

Personally I am having airplane withdrawal, grounded in one place (Singapore) longer than I can remember for at least a decade. This has allowed me to catch up on the backlog of papers to be published and to get serious about my fitness program. However, I am away from family and friends, and look forward to seeing people again. I will say that Singapore is a good place to weather the COVID storm as the government has taken rational and generally effective approaches to deal with waves of viral spread. Hopefully, we will see the end of this soon and life can return to normal. People are not made for isolation. We are social creatures and one thing that has become clear for me is that living in a virtually reality world may be our long-term fate after all.

Brian Kennedy, Director, Centre for Healthy Ageing; Professor, Biochemistry and Physiology, National University of Singapore