Bodies of coronavirus victims have been seen lying in the streets of the Ecuadorian capital amid warnings the pandemic is yet to peak across Latin America.

Forensics experts were seen attending to the corpse of a 65-year-old man suspected of contracting COVID-19 in Quito on Tuesday. Funeral home workers later arrived to load him into a coffin and drive him away.

Ecuador has more than 31,000 confirmed cases of coronavirus, including 1,569 deaths. The toll across Latin America and the Caribbean passed 15,000 on Wednesday, with more than 280,000 cases reported.

‘I still can’t believe what I’m seeing.’ One couple’s apartment overlooks the street where a morgue was erected.

Surveying neighborhoods directly may give a more accurate view than mail-in tests and other methods, researchers say.

“Cannabis extracts are showing potential in making people more resistant to the novel coronavirus, says an Alberta researcher leading a study.

After sifting through 400 cannabis strains, researchers at the University of Lethbridge are concentrating on about a dozen that show promising results in ensuring less fertile ground for the potentially lethal virus to take root, said biological scientist Dr. Igor Kovalchuk.”

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But the absence of clinical trials remains a barrier, and funding from an increasingly cash-strapped cannabis industry isn’t there to fuel that, said Kovalchuk.

“We have clinicians who are willing to work with us but for a lot of companies in the cannabis business, it’s significant cash that they can’t afford,” he said.

The scientist emphasized the findings wouldn’t lead to a vaccine — something “less specific and precise” but nonetheless another possible weapon against COVID-19.

The researchers linked two copies of a special kind of antibody produced by llamas to create a new antibody that binds tightly to a key protein on the coronavirus that causes COVID-19. This protein, called the spike protein, allows the virus to break into host cells. Initial tests indicate that the antibody blocks viruses that display this spike protein from infecting cells in culture.

“This is one of the first antibodies known to neutralize SARS-CoV-2,” said Jason McLellan, associate professor of molecular biosciences at UT Austin and co-senior author, referring to the virus that causes COVID-19.

The team is now preparing to conduct preclinical studies in animals such as hamsters or nonhuman primates, with the hopes of next testing in humans. The goal is to develop a treatment that would help people soon after infection with the virus.

Pulmonologist Zhong Nanshan, known to have discovered the SARS virus in 2003, reported that the pathogen is three times more contagious than common influenza; however, he admits that its spread is likely to slow with the onset of summer.

In the middle of an international pandemic, VICE News goes straight to people who spent years learning how outbreaks work and how humans will respond.

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