Mechanisms of Action of Ribavirin in Antiviral Therapies
| Autor: | Robert C. Tam, Johnson Y.N. Lau, Zhi Hong |
|---|---|
| Rok vydání: | 2001 |
| Předmět: |
0301 basic medicine
Combination therapy T-Lymphocytes viruses Hepatitis C virus 030106 microbiology Virus Replication medicine.disease_cause Antiviral Agents 01 natural sciences Virus 03 medical and health sciences chemistry.chemical_compound Pharmacotherapy Ribavirin Animals Humans RNA Viruses Medicine biology business.industry virus diseases RNA virus General Medicine Hepatitis C Hepatitis C Chronic biology.organism_classification medicine.disease Virology 0104 chemical sciences 010404 medicinal & biomolecular chemistry chemistry Mutagenesis Immunology Drug Therapy Combination Viral disease business |
| Zdroj: | Antiviral Chemistry and Chemotherapy. 12:261-272 |
| ISSN: | 2040-2066 |
| DOI: | 10.1177/095632020101200501 |
| Popis: | Although ribavirin was originally synthesized over 30 years ago and has been used to treat viral infections as monotherapy (respiratory syncytial virus and Lassa fever virus) or with interferon-α (IFN-α) as combination therapy (hepatitis C virus), the precise mechanism of its therapeutic activities remains controversial. In this review we focus on two main biological properties of ribavirin: its indirect and direct antiviral activities (with particular emphasis on its efficacy against chronic hepatitis C infection). Each property could individually or collectively account for its clinical efficacy against viral infections. First, with emphasis on the evidence for indirect activities of ribavirin, we will review the clinical observations that suggest that the immunomodulatory properties of ribavirin can in part account for its antiviral activities in vivo. We will then describe the mode of ribavirin's direct antiviral activities. These direct activities can be ascribed to several possible mechanisms, including the recently described activity as an RNA mutagen, a property that may be important in driving a rapidly mutating RNA virus over the threshold to ‘error catastrophe′. |
| Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
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