My girlfriend died from human metapneumovirus at 30 years young. She had a weakened immune system from lymphangiomatosis, so something like metapneumovirus, which is a mild illness for most people, was a death sentence for her. I hope this fund is successful so nobody else ever has to go through what she did.

It's sad we're resorting to philanthropy to solve problems like this. $500M is chump change.

NASA spent something like $300B in today's money on the Apollo program, and Artemis has exceeded $90B already.

I'm much more keen on never getting sick than prepping for Mars.

> We surveyed attendees ahead of the symposium. One of our questions was: if this doesn’t happen in the next ~10 years, what will the primary reason be? The number one reason cited was lack of funding, followed by technical feasibility. Why hasn’t this field attracted sufficient funding, especially given the enormous societal burden?

Isn't a projected problem with technical feasibility an explanation for lack of funding?

> So, to get closer to elimination, we also need a way to reduce the virions circulating in high density environments. During COVID the world experimented with various interventions like social distancing and personal protective equipment. But to reduce transmission durably for a large number of common respiratory viruses that are perennially circulating, we need solutions that are convenient and minimally disruptive.

We think the most promising category of products that accomplish these goals are those that remove pathogens from the air, particularly in high-density environments like offices, schools, and public transit. We’ll call these air cleaning technologies (ACTs) like air filtration and far-UVC antimicrobial light.

Sounds like a pretty big challenge to me... Ok, during Covid I read that airplane-style air conditioning with nozzles above each seat and used air pumped out at ground level was pretty good in making sure "your" air didn't get mixed up with your neighbor's (masks were still mandatory however on the few flights I took during that period). But how are you going to do the same in a packed subway train in, let's say, Tokyo or New York, at rush hour? That air conditioning unit would probably have to be as heavy as the train itself, and to the passengers it would feel like a hairdryer (on cold setting) blasting at them permanently from above...

> Why haven’t we already seen the same kind of transformation with respiratory viruses?

Because it’s a lot easier to control the supply of a material that has to be actively transported into people’s houses for them to use? I struggle to take them seriously when I didn’t see this basic and fundamental difference even mentioned.

> Healthy people spend roughly 15-25 days each year—about 5% of their lives—sick with respiratory infections like the common cold and influenza

This seems completely unbelievable to me. Totally outside of my personal, professional, and family experience.

As someone who still masks (KN95) in all indoor settings where unmasked people are present, I am all for this. Very much looking forward to seeing where it leads.

The tricky part is that the benefit is invisible. If it works, nothing happens: people just get sick less often. That is a hard thing to sell to building owners and employers unless the evidence and standards are really solid

Noble goal, but tell a bunch of scientists and startups that you've got a grand vision and $500 million in cash to burn, and they're always going to tell you a story about how it could be possible if you give them that money. And your sycophantic AI you use to research and vet will also always tell you there's a chance, if that's what you seem to be wanting.

I am so tremendously excited to see this, I've had quite a few friends become permanently disabled from long covid and even have some lingering symptoms myself from my last infection and so anything to improve access and uptake of air cleaning technologies and new preventatives is amazing.

Can it be dangerous to use uv as it can cause mutations in pathogens potentially making them evolve even faster?

I assume the kind of uv used must be fatal, but is there a chance that a tiny percentage makes it?

I was really disappointed that air cleaning didn’t take off after Covid. Super disappointing to see society just collectively decide to not learn any lessons.

Even if there were no mortality or productivity benefits, you’d think cutting down on cold and flu would be sufficient motivation on its own. Especially in schools and other high risk places.

Kudos to these people.

My son is susceptible to these type of infections and has asthma. He missed 17 days of school last year. Even if not fatal these types of infections are miserable and have an impact on those who get them and their caretakers.

It's important to build on solid foundations, rather than on faulty assumptions. My experience is the standard medical approach to lung problems is basically wrong.

There was a submission ~6 years ago about using ethanol to sanitize people's lungs as a treatment for COVID-19. One of the comments shared a college story about how they were coerced into treating their sniffles with a spoon and vodka: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22745834

In early 2020 I started advocating using the classic herbal treatment for lung problems: apple brandy inhaled from a charred oak keg. The theory is simply that the ethanol is an antiseptic, and the apple and oak flavoring compounds stimulate the lungs to repair themselves.

I found a manufacturer and started selling little 3L kegs. My first customer asked, "can I try it?" I warned that the ethanol burns before you get used to it. I was impressed that he was able to fill his lungs with apple brandy fumes without coughing the first time. After a moment of held breath he darted off. When he came back 1 or 2 minutes later he said, "I'll take one".

He was a big guy. His problem was getting winded between his car and the store. That he could walk for one or two minutes on lungs filled with apple brandy fumes, when he couldn't normally walk without getting winded while breathing normally, was incredible.

2 hours later he called back. The husband of the woman he'd been the driver for that day was ~70 year old husband and coughing himself to death with a case of the COPD. He'd quit smoking ~20 years before, but his lungs never recovered.

Both of these men's lung conditions rapidly improved after they started inhaling apple brandy fumes. After he started huffing on apple brandy 4x/day, the COPD fellow's coughs went away, and his skin went from 'gray' to 'pink'. The other fellow caught the COVID-19 in June or July that year. I heard his lung capacity score was fantastic, the virus was just hitting his kidneys. He survived his hospitalization.

The modern tool that facilitates the inhalation of apple brandy is a nebulizer.

Different story: in 2021/2022 I was emailed by a woman who'd found my youtube video. In 2023 she came out to Arizona to visit, then to stay permanently. She always assumed that her lung problems were related to the asbestos she'd inhaled on 9/11. But since she's started using the apple brandy barrel, she's only had to use her inhaler once in the past 3 years: when she got a lung full of hairspray in the gym's bathroom.

As the submission in the link above indicated at the start of COVID-19, treatment with inhaled ethanol is a reasonable initial treatment for respiratory problems.

Maybe they can send some of this money to the Wuhan Institive of Virology to research respiratory viruses in bats and some to Raph Baric at UNC for vaccine development. What could go wrong?

I'd be interested to see more concerted research into contagious/self-replicable vaccines that are self-replicating and spreadable to a wider swath of people. That seems like a step forward in public health prevention for seasonal illnesses that we have well-engineered and safe vaccines for.

I understand the bar for deployment would need to be high to ensure that side effects are even rare compared to typical voluntary vaccinations.

No idea of whether those people ar competent, or if it's a PR stunt. Good luck to them. I've joked often enough that "a vaccine for common cold" would have changed my life.

Also, I'm:

- happy that they don't claim the breakthrough will come from AI or Blockchain, for once

- a bit surprised that they got founding by both openAi and Anthropic (so of course they'll try to solve a few things with ai and Blockchain, but,who knows.) Aren't those companies loosing vast amount of money at the moment ? What are they doing philanthropy with ? Just borrowing ? Or are investors for their Series XYZ usually ok with the owner using the money to fund pet projects (even if here, the "pet project" is a good idea, and potentially a good customer/ ?

If you want to end respiratory infections: eat healthy, exercise, stop smoking, decrease stress, spend time outside in the sun

no thanks

the premise is wildly disengenious in conflating the pureification of water supplys, and air. a simple set of facts is that humans now represent the largest mass and population of large animals ever to exist. this population inhabits many habitats , both natural and constructed. this population has huge numbers of indivuals who have compromised imune systems. and last, but worst is that humans now constitute a biological niche, and a primary law of biology is the "all niches will be filled"

> Why haven’t we already seen the same kind of transformation with respiratory viruses?

My favorite conspiracy-adjacent theory is that pharmaceutical companies don’t have any intention to give up the multi-billion dollar market of cold and respiratory infections palliatives. Even if there is no ill intent, there are just no market or capitalistic incentives, because a one-shot solution for these pathogens is not going to create a market as rich as the previous one.

To me this is the perfect representation of why believing the market is a positive force is wrong. If not for external pressure, in this case the market clearly signals that it’s best for us all to keep getting colds.

As someone currently with a nasty cold, having to work through it anyhow - please.

While I think it’s a noble idea I think much more could be achieved with much smaller amounts of money. Actually zero. Regulate sugar, introduce a HIGH sugar tax. Introduce higher nicotine and alcohol tax. Introduce stricter environmental controls for poisonous materials and water and air pollution. All these things cost essentially zero to implement, they even bring in money and all of them are credible ways to significantly reduce health problems world wide. But eh, I’m not part of a lobbying organisation, so what do I know.