The COVIRNA project, led by the Luxembourg Institute of Health (LIH), is  one of the 23 research projects awarded within the framework of the Horizon 2020 call for Expression of Interest  “Innovative and rapid health-related approaches to respond to COVID-19 and to deliver quick results for society for a higher level of preparedness of health systems”. The project aims to foster the development of a novel diagnostic test to predict COVID-19 outcomes for patients and improve the cooperation between European research institutions to strengthen the response to the pandemic.

 

In this context, and building on the network developed within the EU-CardioRNA (“Catalyzing transcriptomics research in cardiovascular disease”) COST Action, a consortium of 15 partners polled their expertise and resources (notably by providing access to various European COVID-19 clinical cohorts) to build a multidisciplinary and multicentre study with the common aim to improve individualised surveillance, care and follow-up of COVID-19 patients in the context of the current pandemic.

 

The team will conduct a large retrospective study on multiple existing cohorts of COVID-19 patients throughout Europe and upscale the already validated and patented “FIMICS” panel of cardiac-enriched long noncoding RNA biomarkers into an in-vitro diagnostic test (COVIRNA), adapted to COVID-19 patients. The study will therefore rapidly deliver a minimally-invasive, simple yet robust and affordable prognostic assay that can be used in the context of the current COVID-19 pandemic, as well as in further major health crises.

 

The COVIRNA team:

→  Luxembourg Institute of Health (LU)

→  Firalis SA (FR)

→ University of Luxembourg (LU)

→ Imperial College of Science and Technology Medicine (UK)

→ University of Maastricht (NL)

→ European Health Management Association (BE)

→ Heinrich-Heine-University of Düsseldorf (DE)

→ The University of Edinburgh (UK)

→ International University of Sarajevo (BA)

→ San Donato Polyclinic SPA (IT)

→ Pharmahungary 2000 Kft (HU)

→ University of Leipzig (DE)

→ Jožef Stefan Institute (SI)

→ Fundació Privada Institut de Recerca de l`Hospital de la Santa Creu i Sant Pau (SP)

→ University of Coimbra (PT)