Pentagon medical researchers have created a microchip that will detect COVID-19 when inserted under the skin.
Relax, conspiracy theorists – they are not spread by vaccines.
The revolutionary technology was developed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, which operates under the Pentagon umbrella, according to Sunday night’s “60 Minutes.” The top-secret unit was launched during the Cold War to study emerging technologies for military use – including innovations to protect soldiers from biological weapons.
Col. Dr. Matt Hepburn, an infectious disease physician, revealed that the microchip, which is not widely used outside the Department of Defense, could detect COVID-19 in an individual well before a patient causes an outbreak. zero.
“We challenge the research community to come up with solutions that look like science fiction,” said Hepburn, whose role at DARPA, he added, is to “get pandemics off the table.”
Hepburn compared his diagnostic microchip to the “engine check” alert of a car.
Despite conspiracy theories that Microsoft’s Bill Gates uses vaccines as a vehicle to introduce a microscopic system of global positioning into our bodies, “60 Minutes” made it clear that the DARPA chip will not “track every move.” It is not even administered by shooting, as some potential Twitter fans thought.
“It’s a sensor,” Hepburn told CBS correspondent Bill Whitaker. “The little green thing there, you put it under the skin and what it tells you is that there are chemical reactions in the body and that the signal means that you will have symptoms tomorrow.”
The microchip, embedded in a tissue-like gel, is designed to continuously test the blood of the recipient of the chip to detect the presence of the virus. Once COVID-19 is detected, the chip alerts the patient to a rapid self-administered blood test to confirm the positive result.
“We can have this information in three to five minutes,” Hepburn said. “As you truncate that time, as you diagnose and treat it, what you do is stop the infection.”
The segment also revealed a technology that would allow a standard dialysis machine to remove COVID-19 from the blood using a custom filter. The blood is passed through the machine, where it is detoxified, then pumped back into the body in a continuous flow until the body gets rid of the virus.
A military husband named “Patient 16” survived a severe bout of the disease, including organ failure and septic shock, thanks to the new dialysis machine. The treatment lasted four days, after which patient 16 fully recovered.
DARPA scientists say their research is extremely important for preventing outbreaks in crowded military neighborhoods, such as the one on the USS Theodore Roosevelt in March and April 2020, which saw 1,271 crew members test positive for coronavirus. .
Pentagon researchers continue to study COVID-19 and much of their research has been instrumental in stopping the pandemic, including new methods of detecting and developing antibodies in about 10 weeks – a fraction of the six to 24 months previously required.
They hope to ultimately reduce the gap between the detection of new diseases and the development of the vaccine.
Finally, said Dr. James Crowe, a DARPA scientist, “We would leave a blood sample from a survivor … and we would give you a medicine injection within 60 days. ”
“For us at DARPA, if the experts laugh at you and say it’s impossible, you’re in the right place,” Hepburn said.