HEAT Corporation, a UN registered vendor has started marketing two stage face mask media designed to inactivate viruses that cause MERS and SARS. The question was will pH changes inactivate coronaviruses (Co-V) that cause diseases such as SARS and MERS. Certain viruses (including the rhinoviruses and coronaviruses that are most often responsible for the common cold and influenza viruses that produ
ce flu) infect host cells by fusion with cellular membranes at low pH. Thus they are classified as "pH-dependent viruses," said William L. It’s a known fact that Influenza viruses are affected by low pH, which is why citric acid (pH 2.2) will inactivate them. Viral inactivation studies show that influenza viruses are rapidly inactivated by contact with acid buffered solutions at pH 3.5. The titre of influenza A Sydney/5/97 [H3N2] was reduced by at least 3 log cycles with one minute contact with buffers based on simple acid mixtures such as L-pyroglutamic acid, succinic acid, citric acid and ascorbic acid. Coronavirus infectivity is exquisitely sensitive to pH. For example, the MHV-A59 strain of coronavirus is quite stable at pH 6.0 (acidic) but becomes rapidly and irreversibly inactivated by brief treatment at pH 8.0 (alkaline). Infection of cells by murine coronavirus A59 at pH 6.0 (acidic) rather than pH 7.0 (neutral) yields a tenfold increase in the infectivity of the virus. Human coronavirus strain 229E is maximally infective at pH 6.0. Drugs that increase intracellular pH (alkalinity within the cell) have been shown to decrease infectivity of pH-dependent viruses. However pharmaceutical drugs that do this can provoke negative side effects. “The pH of our water and Zeolite based Curie formula is 8-8.5! Since the RNA (and sub-particles) of inactivated coronavirus is positively charged the negatively charged zeolites will attract them for absorption. Zeolites containing viral particles will increase the upregulation and induction of interferon and natural phagocytic activity upon entry into a biological system,” Robinson said.
