| From the onset of the COVID-19 crisis, specialists like Dr. Antony Fauci and Dr. Deborah Birx have become regular fixtures on cable television, as Americans looked for medical leadership and guidance during this public health emergency. |
| Even prior to talking points on face masks and social distancing grabbing the public eye, Dr. Keith Steele '79 centered his career on the study of disease and vaccine research. |
| Steele currently works as an independent consultant but spent the last ten years working as a senior pathologist at AstraZeneca (previously Medimmune). His research centered on developing immunotherapies for human cancers. Prior to his time at AstraZeneca, Steele was active duty military in the Army Medical Department and worked at the United States Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID) and the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research, where his vaccine research revolved around diseases like Ebola virus. |
| "Pathology is a great way to investigate why, what makes things work, or why diseases function like they do," Steele explained. "Once you understand how it works, then you have some basis for trying to figure out how to fix it. Since pathology is the study of disease, which is inherently broad, there is just so much capacity to investigate why and how diseases function in nature." |
| As a part of his work as a research pathologist, he focused on pathogenesis – the mechanisms by which diseases occur – and translational science in drug development. As a part of translational science in vaccine research, the emphasis remains on both the transition from lab to bedside and demonstrating the safety and efficacy of the vaccine. |
| "Most of my career involved developing the tools we need to investigate these diseases in new ways," he said. "I switched from vaccine development and infectious diseases to understanding the pathogenesis of cancer and developing drugs for that disease. As a pathologist who spent a lot of time developing the tools, [that] allowed me to make the switch from infectious diseases to cancer, because the tools are very much the same. How you use them is done differently, but the tools themselves do not change that much." |
| Cancer patients are particularly at risk during this current pandemic. Along with being immunosuppressed because of either cancer or their chemotherapies, they tend to be elderly and have higher incidence of diabetes, lung, or heart diseases, which elevates their susceptibility to COVID-19. |
| "It's also true that everything is slowed down now," he said. "Everything is hard and slow, going to the grocery store or the hospital is hard and slow. Some patients are avoiding doctors and hospitals now. Some of this avoidance stems from concerns about coming in contact with COVID-19. On top of this, clinical trials of drug therapies for cancer patients has slowed down. It all makes the medical care more difficult to provide to the cancer patients who need it." |
| Steele emphasizes that an important takeaway from the response to COVID-19 is that our healthcare system should have been more prepared for a general pandemic-level disease, in terms of stockpiling everyday equipment and supplies. |
| "What we lacked in our medical preparedness is just all those underlying abilities to diagnose and treat a high volume of patients with any infectious disease," he said. "What are the items that remain in low supply? For example, early on the swabs to sample patients so you can actually run the test were lacking, not necessarily the test kit itself. As well, the PPE that these doctors and nurses need to be able to safely do their job and treat patients have been insufficient. It is just these very basic, but critically important aspects of medical care where we were unprepared." |
| Beyond our current supply chain issues, this pandemic will fundamentally change how we go about our lives and daily routines. |
| "This may be, fundamentally, the biggest thing that happens in our lives," Steele said. "It is going to change our lives, politics, and social behaviors. It is already changing the way we do education. Economies clearly are going to change because of this. This outbreak is going to have a lot of different consequences and it is going to happen over a number of years. In fact, we will probably never do some things exactly the way we were doing them six months ago." |
