Support to the Massachusetts Consortium on Pathogen Readiness (MassCPR) to address the COVID -19 pandemic

The NLM Family Foundation has made a  grant to the Massachusetts Consortium on Pathogen Readiness (MassCPR) to support its crucial work addressing the COVID -19 pandemic and pathogenic disease. MassCPR’s rapid response to the Coronavirus crisis and creation of clinical/research collaborations have been remarkable.

The grant is for support of the research and clinical priorities of the MassCPR under the direction of the Dean of the Faculty of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and the MassCPR Steering Committee. This funding will be used to support the highest priority COVID-19 related activities, particularly those with promise for novel diagnostics, therapeutics, or vaccines.

The goal of the MassCPR is to develop and invest in both the research process and supporting infrastructure to address the current global COVID-19 pandemic, and better position the Consortium for potential future outbreaks.

The initial efforts of the MassCPR are aimed at elucidating the basic biology of the SARS-CoV-2 virus and the pathogenesis of the resulting disease, developing new diagnostic tools, vaccines, and antiviral therapies, creating and using animal and other model systems, understanding disease epidemiology, and leveraging clinical expertise to improve medical management.