Thursday, researchers announced that they were getting closer to finding a cure for the common cold, since they had decoded the genomes of the 99 strains of common cold virus and had drawn up a catalog of its weak points.

Stephen B. Liggett, an asthma expert at the University of Maryland who also co-authored the discovery, stated that researchers had found the cold virus’ Achilles heel and that a very effective treatment for it was not far from being brought forth.

Moreover, the drug to cure the common cold could also account for a major breakthrough where the 20 million people suffering from asthma and the million other who have developed chronic obstructive pulmonary disease are concerned.

Presently, scientists believe that the common cold virus, which is a rhinovirus, is considered responsible for giving rise to 50 percent of all asthma attacks.

Nevertheless, even if a treatment for the common cold is found, the difficulty will arise from drawing the pharmaceutical companies’ attention, Dr. Glenn Tillotson, an expert on antiviral drugs at Viropharma in Exton, Pa., stated, informing that the cost for developing a new drug amounted to $700 million.

Moreover, Carl Seiden, president of Seiden Pharmaceutical Strategies and a longtime industry analyst and consultant, said that the industry might be reluctant towards a common cold drug, given that Relenza and Tamiflu, which are two meds that alleviated the flu’s symptoms but did not cure it, translated as major commercial failures.