SARS-CoV-2 has been the causative pathogen of the pandemic of COVID-19, resulting in catastrophic health issues globally. It is important to develop human-like animal models for investigating the mechanisms that SARS-CoV-2 uses to infect humans and cause COVID-19. Several studies demonstrated that the non-human primate (NHP) is permissive for SARS-CoV-2 infection to cause typical clinical symptoms including fever, cough, breathing difficulty, and other diagnostic abnormalities such as immunopathogenesis and hyperplastic lesions in the lung. These NHP models have been used for investigating the potential infection route and host immune response to SARS-CoV-2, as well as testing vaccines and drugs. This review aims to summarize the benefits and caveats of NHP models currently available for SARS-CoV-2, and to discuss key topics including model optimization, extended application, and clinical translation.
Keywords: SARS-CoV-2; immunopathogenesis; non-human primates; severe acute respiratory syndrome; vaccine and drug discovery.