We tend to just think of viruses in terms of their damaging impacts on human health and lives. The 1918 flu pandemic killed around 50 million people. Smallpox claimed 30% of those who caught it, and survivors were often scarred and blinded. More recently, we’re all too familiar with the health and economic impacts of COVID.

But viruses can also be used to benefit human health, agriculture and the environment.

Viruses are comparatively simple in structure, consisting of a piece of genetic material (RNA or DNA) enclosed in a protein coat (the capsid). Some also have an outer envelope.

Viruses get into your cells and use your cell machinery to copy themselves.
Here are six ways we’ve harnessed this for health care and pest control.

1. To correct genes

Viruses are used in some gene therapies to correct malfunctioning genes. Genes are DNA sequences that code for a particular protein required for cell function.

If we remove viral genetic material from the capsid (protein coat) we can use the space to transport a “cargo” into cells. These modified viruses are called “viral vectors”.

Viral vectors can deliver a functional gene into someone with a genetic disorder whose own gene is not working properly.

Some genetic diseases treated this way include haemophilia, sickle cell disease and beta thalassaemia.

2. Treat cancer

Viral vectors can be used to treat cancer.

Healthy people have p53, a tumour-suppressor gene. About half of cancers are associated with the loss of p53.

Replacing the damaged p53 gene using a viral vector stops the cancerous cell from replicating and tells it to suicide (apoptosis).

Viral vectors can also be used to deliver an inactive drug to a tumour, where it is then activated to kill the tumour cell.

This targeted therapy reduces the side effects otherwise seen with cytotoxic (cell-killing) drugs.

We can also use oncolytic (cancer cell-destroying) viruses to treat some types of cancer.

Tumour cells have often lost their antiviral defences. In the case of melanoma, a modified herpes simplex virus can kill rapidly dividing melanoma cells while largely leaving non-tumour cells alone.

3. Create immune responses

Viral vectors can create a protective immune response to a particular viral antigen.

One COVID vaccine uses a modified chimp adenovirus (adenoviruses cause the common cold in humans) to transport RNA coding for the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein into human cells.

The RNA is then used to make spike protein copies, which stimulate our immune cells to replicate and “remember” the spike protein.

Then, when you are exposed to SARS-CoV-2 for real, your immune system can churn out lots of antibodies and virus-killing cells very quickly to prevent or reduce the severity of infection.

4. Act as vaccines

Viruses can be modified to act directly as vaccines themselves in several ways.

We can weaken a virus (for an attenuated virus vaccine) so it doesn’t cause infection in a healthy host but can still replicate to stimulate the immune response. The chickenpox vaccine works like this.

The Salk vaccine for polio uses a whole virus that has been inactivated (so it can’t cause disease).

Others use a small part of the virus such as a capsid protein to stimulate an immune response (subunit vaccines).

An mRNA vaccine packages up viral RNA for a specific protein that will stimulate an immune response.

5. Kill bacteria

Viruses can – in limited situations in Australia – be used to treat antibiotic-resistant bacterial infections.

Bacteriophages are viruses that kill bacteria. Each type of phage usually infects a particular species of bacteria.

Unlike antibiotics – which often kill “good” bacteria along with the disease-causing ones – phage therapy leaves your normal flora (useful microbes) intact.

6. Target plant, fungal or animal pests

Viruses can be species-specific (infecting one species only) and even cell-specific (infecting one type of cell only).

This occurs because the proteins viruses use to attach to cells have a shape that binds to a specific type of cell receptor or molecule, like a specific key fits a lock.

The virus can enter the cells of all species with this receptor/molecule. For example, rabies virus can infect all mammals because we share the right receptor, and mammals have other characteristics that allow infection to occur whereas other non-mammal species don’t.

When the receptor is only found on one cell type, then the virus will infect that cell type, which may only be found in one or a limited number of species. Hepatitis B virus successfully infects liver cells primarily in humans and chimps.

We can use that property of specificity to target invasive plant species (reducing the need for chemical herbicides) and pest insects (reducing the need for chemical insecticides). Baculoviruses, for example, are used to control caterpillars.

Similarly, bacteriophages can be used to control bacterial tomato and grapevine diseases.

Other viruses reduce plant damage from fungal pests.

Myxoma virus and calicivirus reduce rabbit populations and their environmental impacts and improve agricultural production.

Just like humans can be protected against by vaccination, plants can be “immunised” against a disease-causing virus by being exposed to a milder version.

Thea van de Mortel, Professor, Nursing, School of Nursing and Midwifery, Griffith University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Creating art for healing purposes dates back tens of thousands of years, to the practices of First Nations people around the world. Art therapy uses creative processes, primarily visual art such as painting, drawing or sculpture, with a view to improving physical health and emotional wellbeing.

When people face significant physical or mental ill-health, it can be challenging to put their experiences into words. Art therapists support people to explore and process overwhelming thoughts, feelings and experiences through a reflective art-making process. This is distinct from art classes, which often focus on technical aspects of the artwork, or the aesthetics of the final product.

Art therapy can be used to support treatment for a wide range of physical and mental health conditions. It has been linked to benefits including improved self-awareness, social connection and emotional regulation, while lowering levels of distress, anxiety and even pain scores.

In a study published this week in the Journal of Mental Health, we found art therapy was associated with positive outcomes for children and adolescents in a hospital-based mental health unit.

An option for those who can’t find the words

While a person’s engagement in talk therapies may sometimes be affected by the nature of their illness, verbal reflection is optional in art therapy.

Where possible, after finishing an artwork, a person can explore the meaning of their work with the art therapist, translating unspoken symbolic material into verbal reflection.

However, as the talking component is less central to the therapeutic process, art therapy is an accessible option for people who may not be able to find the words to describe their experiences.

Art therapy has supported improved mental health outcomes for people who have experienced trauma, people with eating disorders, schizophrenia and dementia, as well as children with autism.

Art therapy has also been linked to improved outcomes for people with a range of physical health conditions. These include lower levels of anxiety, depression and fatigue among people with cancer, enhanced psychological stability for patients with heart disease, and improved social connection among people who have experienced a traumatic brain injury.

Art therapy has been associated with improved mood and anxiety levels for patients in hospital, and lower pain, tiredness and depression among palliative care patients.

Our research

Mental ill-health, including among children and young people, presents a major challenge for our society. While most care takes place in the community, a small proportion of young people require care in hospital to ensure their safety.

In this environment, practices that place even greater restriction, such as seclusion or physical restraint, may be used briefly as a last resort to ensure immediate physical safety. However, these “restrictive practices” are associated with negative effects such as post-traumatic stress for patients and health professionals.

Worryingly, staff report a lack of alternatives to keep patients safe. However, the elimination of restrictive practices is a major aim of mental health services in Australia and internationally.

Our research looked at more than six years of data from a child and adolescent mental health hospital ward in Australia. We sought to determine whether there was a reduction in restrictive practices during the periods when art therapy was offered on the unit, compared to times when it was absent.

We found a clear association between the provision of art therapy and reduced frequency of seclusion, physical restraint and injection of sedatives on the unit.

We don’t know the precise reason for this. However, art therapy may have lessened levels of severe distress among patients, thereby reducing the risk they would harm themselves or others, and the likelihood of staff using restrictive practices to prevent this.

That said, hospital admission involves multiple therapeutic interventions including talk-based therapies and medications. Confirming the effect of a therapeutic intervention requires controlled clinical trials where people are randomly assigned one treatment or another.

Although ours was an observational study, randomised controlled trials support the benefits of art therapy in youth mental health services. For instance, a 2011 hospital-based study showed reduced symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder among adolescents randomised to trauma-focussed art therapy compared to a “control” arts and crafts group.

What do young people think?

In previous research we found art therapy was considered by adolescents in hospital-based mental health care to be the most helpful group therapy intervention compared to other talk-based therapy groups and creative activities.

In research not yet published, we’re speaking with young people to better understand their experiences of art therapy, and why it might reduce distress. One young person accessing art therapy in an acute mental health service shared:

[Art therapy] is a way of sort of letting out your emotions in a way that doesn’t involve being judged […] It let me release a lot of stuff that was bottling up and stuff that I couldn’t explain through words.

A promising area

The burgeoning research showing the benefits of art therapy for both physical and especially mental health highlights the value of creative and innovative approaches to treatment in health care.

There are opportunities to expand art therapy services in a range of health-care settings. Doing so would enable greater access to art therapy for people with a variety of physical and mental health conditions.

Sarah Versitano, Academic, Master of Art Therapy Program, Western Sydney University and Iain Perkes, Senior Lecturer, Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, UNSW Sydney

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.