'Cure': Company claims coronavirus antibody breakthrough

Navy Petty Officer 2nd Class Cecil Dorse, left, and Navy Petty Officer 3rd Class Janet Rosas test blood samples aboard the Military Sealift Command hospital ship USNS Comfort while the ship is in New York City in support of the nation’s COVID-19 response, April 6, 2020. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Sara Eshleman)

An antibody has been discovered that could shield the human body from the coronavirus and flush it out of a person's system within four days, claims a California-based biopharmaceutical company,

Fox News reported exclusively that Sorrento Therapeutics of San Diego will announce its discovery of the STI-1499 antibody, which could be available as a treatment months before a vaccine hits the market.

The company says the antibody can provide "100% inhibition" of COVID-19.

"We want to emphasize there is a cure. There is a solution that works 100 percent," Dr. Henry Ji, founder and CEO of Sorrento Therapeutics, told Fox News. "If we have the neutralizing antibody in your body, you don't need the social distancing. You can open up a society without fear."

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Ji said the antibody "puts its arms around the virus."

"It wraps around the virus and moves them out of the body."

FoxNews.com noted antibody treatments have been used for the past 100 years to stave off infections but with mixed results.

Former Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Scott Gottlieb explained in a recent Wall Street Journal op-ed that doctors are "taking blood plasma from patients who have recovered from COVID-19 and infusing it into those who are critically ill."

"The plasma is laden with antibodies, and the approach shows some promise," he said. "The constraint: There isn’t enough plasma from recovered patients to go around."

WND reported earlier this month scientists in the Netherlands who studied the SARS virus have identified an antibody that prevents the novel coronavirus from infecting human cells.

Britain's Sky News reported the researchers at Utrecht University, the Erasmus University Medical Center in Rotterdam and the Cambridge, Massachusetts-based company Harbour BioMed have identified a potential method of neutralizing COVID-19, the report said, describing the step as "groundbreaking."

Their peer-reviewed study published in Nature Communications concluded an antibody that prevents the SARS virus from infecting human cells also could block COVID-19.

The find may not be an instant solution to the coronavirus but could offer a step toward developing a fully human antibody to treat or prevent COVID-19.

The SARS outbreak, from 2002 to 2004, infected 8,000 people worldwide and killed nearly 800.

Dr. Frank Grosveld, a co-author of the study, called the breakthrough a "strong foundation for additional research to characterize this antibody and begin development as a potential COVID-19 treatment."

His co-author, Dr. Berend-Jan Bosh, said, Sky News reported, it "has potential to alter the course of infection in the infected host, support virus clearance or protect an uninfected individual that is exposed."

The antibody was developed in Harbour BioMed's technology lab, which uses "humanized" mice to allow researchers to develop treatments without testing them on living people, the report said.