Christine T Styles, Jie Zhou, Katie E Flight, Jonathan C Brown, Charlotte Lewis, Xinyu Wang, Michael Vanden Oever, Thomas P Peacock, Ziyin Wang, Rosie Millns, John S O'Neill, Alexander Borodavka, Joe Grove, Wendy S Barclay, John S Tregoning, Rachel S Edgar
Viruses are vulnerable as they transmit between hosts, and we aimed to exploit this critical window. We found that the ubiquitous, safe, inexpensive and biodegradable small molecule propylene glycol (PG) has robust virucidal activity. Propylene glycol rapidly inactivates a broad range of viruses including influenza A, SARS-CoV-2 and rotavirus and reduces disease burden in mice when administered intranasally at concentrations commonly found in nasal sprays. Most critically, vaporised PG efficiently abolishes influenza A virus and SARS-CoV-2 infectivity within airborne droplets, potently preventing infection at levels well below those tolerated by mammals...
December 7, 2023: EMBO Molecular Medicine