15-minute visit to the COVID-19 laboratory: volunteer sleepless nights and the dangers of opening a test tube

We visited the laboratory in a modern building in the capital’s Sunrise district on Wednesday afternoon. Here we met the scientists Eglė Lastauskienė and Kristina Daniūnaitė, and before entering, they were instructed to protect themselves from head to toe with protective equipment.

The entrance to the research laboratory consists of several levels: in the first room you should wash your hands, put on a moisture resistant suit, put on booties, put on a hat and a mask. In the preparation, later, one can notice a red line drawn on the ground: it turns out that this is the limit that the mails that arrive here and that present samples for analysis cannot cross.

We went to the next room. She is smaller. We put on gloves. And we place it so that there are no cracks between the suit and the gloves. Wrap the edges of the glove around the wrists with a special adhesive tape. Then wide glasses travel down the nose. We disinfect your hands. We check if everything is covered or comfortable, and we can enter the research rooms.

A second layer of gloves is waiting for you. Once they are put on, the hands are disinfected again and then it is possible to work.

10 minutes to dress and blanch

“We are used to working with gloves, our whole lives with them. But here are double gloves, this flexibility of the fingers may be a little less.

Of course, the pressure on the face, the pressure on the head of the glasses, the protectors, the pressure of the respirator remain, but our changes are not so long as to cause great discomfort. ” 15 minutes E.Lastauskienė said, adding that the jumpsuits are very comfortable, one size fits all.

If you forget something outside the lab, or if you need to run away for a short time, the entire team travels in a certain sequence to the trash, and when you return, you need to prepare everything again.

The government concerned provides the protective equipment for the laboratory against the emergency situation of COVID-19 in Lithuania. Laboratory staff now fix them in about 10 minutes, but in the past it took longer.

“When we learn after this month, it takes time to get dressed fast enough, but in any case, it takes about 10 minutes. The mere fact that you need to glue gloves, glue all the zippers so that nothing gets anywhere will take about 10 minutes, ”said E. Lastauskienė.

Consequences of low pressure.

In order for the humidity in the laboratory facilities to settle, the pressure is regulated here: it is lower than usual and this has a slight effect on health.

“In the first days my head hurt if I worked longer. At low pressure, the air dries a lot, you need a lot of cream when it comes to saving the skin,” said E. Lastauskienė, although he noted that he does not feel any effect at all. long term.

“Again, maybe you get tired of working long hours, you get tired faster,” he added.

This is a high risk area.

The researcher rated the environment in which he works incomparably safer than, say, a store, but the risks are still there:

The coronavirus is currently being tested in the laboratory by 15 people.

“We are 15 of us today. One person will help with the data entry, maybe we will be 16.”

We are divided at work, we have several shifts. For example, RNA (ribonucleic acid to help identify the structure of the virus – 15 minutes) dispatchers change three times a day, working somewhere for five hours. But those five hours does not mean they are always sitting inside. It means they come, with their clothes on … They get about four hours of normal work, “said E. Lastauskienė.

Hundreds of surveys a day.

Usually, according to her, all three shifts extend at 8 p.m. tomorrow at 11 p.m. In the afternoon. But there are all kinds of days.

When the answers come, you put them in the system overnight and try to get people to get them as soon as possible.

“I’m sitting inside for 14 hours. There are days when you have to sit longer. And of course, the invisible side is that after the lab, when the answers come in, you put them in the system all night and try to get them there as soon as possible, “said the researcher.

According to her, it is possible to perform 600 tests for COVID-19 in the VU laboratory, but this is an unusual number.

“Since the volunteers work here so they don’t get tired, it’s optimal for us to do up to 400 tests,” said E. Lastauskienė.

Smears for testing arrive at the Vilnius County Laboratory and are performed the same day.

“Probably all the laboratories will obtain samples for that day. Basically what you get is that sample taken either in the morning or at lunch. This is a matter of several hours here ”, assured E. Lastauskienė.

Samples open only in laminar

And investigator K. Daniūnaitė spoke about how the investigation process is carried out.

“The samples reach us through a separate isolated staircase, a separate path […]. Samples are accepted and they travel to the first laboratory, a smaller room where the sample is drawn from all packages, registered and given a unique laboratory operation code.

Such a sample then travels to the RNA preparation laboratory. There, in a laminar, in a safe environment, the sample is opened, the appropriate amount is taken, as necessary for the test, and the RNA is purified from it. The remaining sample that is no longer used is ready for long-term storage.

We can study up to 93 people in one reaction at a time.

The RNA is purified in several steps to carry out further diagnostic tests. Such a sample travels again from one laboratory to another where the test itself is performed.

There, again in a sterile environment, in a laminar, the researchers prepare reactions, appropriate reagents, appropriate samples. We can study up to 93 people in one reaction at a time. And said reaction prepared on the plate is placed in a real-time thermocycler, that is, a certain device that performs the reaction with precision. And in the course of the reaction, we can already see the first results, “said the researcher.

The laminar air flow is visually seen as a device with a transparent partition. Only behind him is he working with open tubes that may contain COVID-19 infection.

Freezer almost full of analyzed samples.

A pair of refrigerators can also be found in the laboratory facilities, one of ours, used in a home where sample waste is stored. In the special 20 thousand. All samples analyzed, both those detected with COVID-19 and those free from viruses, are stored in a freezer with a minimum temperature of 80 degrees Celsius.

Until now, its storage time is not limited, although the refrigerator in the VU laboratory is almost full.

When asked where the samples will go when the refrigerator is completely full, K. Daniūnaitė replied that he will have to find another place to store.

She, like the other 14 researchers, is testing COVID-19 on a voluntary basis: the experience was useful and necessary.

“Probably all scientists would say that here by vocation. For us, it is a kind of experience. We can self-assess how our everyday methods are appropriate in practice.

We discovered that there is such a great need.

Studying human samples was not new to us, only the sample flows were complicated enough, because we do not have such large amounts in daily practice. Almost that determined sporting interest: necessity, let’s try it. Another thing, we discovered that there is a great need for it, ”explained K. Daniūnaitė.

“It would be just irresponsible and ugly not to contribute”

E. Lastauskienė also called his colleague: “The time has come to help and increase the volume. We have consulted with the National Center for Public Health and say whether we will make a significant contribution here if we only do a few hundred studies. They say, of those few hundred and they form those thousands of analyzed samples that you see every day.

And the other thing is that if we all sit at home and nobody does anything, probably nobody will investigate anything. Because we have the skills, the tools, the big labs, it would be just irresponsible and ugly not to contribute. “

Rimvydas Petrauskas, Chancellor of VU, was pleased with the voluntary participation of the higher education community in trying to manage the crisis caused by the coronavirus.

“I am very pleased that our entire academic community, both teachers and students, has participated in a wide variety of volunteer activities. Almost a third of the National Public Health Center volunteers are students at our university.

The participation, comments and interpretation of various aspects of this problem, from the spread of the virus to psychological problems, contributes greatly to the rationalization of the problem, as well as to the tranquility of society, “he commented in a press conference in center.

The laboratory was adapted in 12 days.

Gintaras Valinčius, director of the VU Life Sciences Center, mentioned that around 30 people initially expressed their desire to voluntarily analyze samples of COVID-19: they were unable to participate because some of them are at risk. Although I had experience working in difficult conditions, in high-level biosafety laboratories. “

Investigators are wasting time on the COVID-19 investigation.

“All this work is done by people sometimes at night, during their free time, who stay the same. They continue teaching in extremely extreme conditions, remotely […]You have to continue completing your research projects, and there is also additional work that we can really call it true volunteering. There is definitely work that cannot be measured in money here, ”said R. Petrauskas.

Immeasurable work is really being done here.

A laboratory was established to analyze COVID-19 samples in VU within 12 days.

“It is an absolutely fantastic rhythm. Here is a scientific laboratory, now it is like a diagnostic laboratory in polyclinics, as in medical centers. Here come clinical samples of people, we work according to the standards established by the Ministry of Health, and that laboratory is established within 12 days. Volunteers gathered, a laboratory was established, methodologies and documents were prepared, “said the head of the names center.

About 60 positive cases of COVID-19 were identified

To begin analyzing the COVID-19 samples, the high school had to purchase a device that screened 20,000. euros

“We had to buy one thing and invest the funds of the Vilnius University ourselves […]. It looks like a big, big fridge, but it costs $ 20,000. euros It is programmable, it sends a signal every time [šaldytuvą] opened what once closed. Biologically dangerous substances are stored there, “explained G. Valčiusčius.

The first coronavirus samples arrived at the laboratory, he said, in early April: “We have found about 60 patients.”

“I am not exaggerating: today we are serving Lithuania, we are serving its people,” he said.

– We have counted how many hours each volunteer worked, but certainly nobody in the first month received a single euro, neither in March nor in April. Now we are already thinking about finding opportunities somehow [atlyginti už darbą] far from our own resources, but we believe that the state will also contribute. “

The Rector also confirmed that VU contributes to the management of the COVID-19 pandemic from his own pocket.

Expect government support

“Now we are doing it at our expense, but there is a preliminary agreement and the belief that the government will contribute,” he hoped.

There is a tentative agreement and faith that the Government will contribute.

A dialogue emerged between politics, government and science, assured the rector, and hoped that this experience would develop further.

“Crises are a disaster, crises limit our lives, but they sharpen some things worth remembering after that and when we return to normal life,” said R. Petrauskas.

He said that VU researchers not only analyze samples of COVID-19 in the laboratory of the Life Sciences Center, but also predict how the virus will spread in Lithuania. According to R. Petrauskas, the fact that their results did not coincide with the truly identified cases of COVID-19 infection is not an error. This only shows that the scientists’ predictions have been answered.

“The success of science here is that by anticipating and saying what the numbers are, in a sense, they have led to government decisions that would further tighten and control the pandemic.

Perhaps if those measures had not been taken, those figures would have become a reality, “said the rector.

In Lithuania, COVID-19 is run by 12 institutions in addition to the VU Life Sciences Center.