Related Research Articles
Antiviral drugs are a class of medication used for treating viral infections. Most antivirals target specific viruses, while a broad-spectrum antiviral is effective against a wide range of viruses. Antiviral drugs are one class of antimicrobials, a larger group which also includes antibiotic, antifungal and antiparasitic drugs, or antiviral drugs based on monoclonal antibodies. Most antivirals are considered relatively harmless to the host, and therefore can be used to treat infections. They should be distinguished from virucides, which are not medication but deactivate or destroy virus particles, either inside or outside the body. Natural virucides are produced by some plants such as eucalyptus and Australian tea trees.
Zidovudine (ZDV), also known as azidothymidine (AZT), is an antiretroviral medication used to prevent and treat HIV/AIDS. It is generally recommended for use in combination with other antiretrovirals. It may be used to prevent mother-to-child spread during birth or after a needlestick injury or other potential exposure. It is sold both by itself and together as lamivudine/zidovudine and abacavir/lamivudine/zidovudine. It can be used by mouth or by slow injection into a vein.
The management of HIV/AIDS normally includes the use of multiple antiretroviral drugs as a strategy to control HIV infection. There are several classes of antiretroviral agents that act on different stages of the HIV life-cycle. The use of multiple drugs that act on different viral targets is known as highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART). HAART decreases the patient's total burden of HIV, maintains function of the immune system, and prevents opportunistic infections that often lead to death. HAART also prevents the transmission of HIV between serodiscordant same-sex and opposite-sex partners so long as the HIV-positive partner maintains an undetectable viral load.
Enfuvirtide (INN), sold under the brand name Fuzeon, is an HIV fusion inhibitor, the first of a class of antiretroviral drugs used in combination therapy for the treatment of AIDS/HIV.
Lamivudine, commonly called 3TC, is an antiretroviral medication used to prevent and treat HIV/AIDS. It is also used to treat chronic hepatitis B when other options are not possible. It is effective against both HIV-1 and HIV-2. It is typically used in combination with other antiretrovirals such as zidovudine and abacavir. Lamivudine may be included as part of post-exposure prevention in those who have been potentially exposed to HIV. Lamivudine is taken by mouth as a liquid or tablet.
Integrase inhibitors (INIs) are a class of antiretroviral drug designed to block the action of integrase, a viral enzyme that inserts the viral genome into the DNA of the host cell. Since integration is a vital step in retroviral replication, blocking it can halt further spread of the virus. Integrase inhibitors were initially developed for the treatment of HIV infection but have been applied to other retroviruses. The class of integrase inhibitors called integrase strand transfer inhibitors (INSTIs) are in established medical use. Other classes, such as integrase binding inhibitors (INBIs), are still experimental.
A resistance mutation is a mutation in a virus gene that allows the virus to become resistant to treatment with a particular antiviral drug. The term was first used in the management of HIV, the first virus in which genome sequencing was routinely used to look for drug resistance. At the time of infection, a virus will infect and begin to replicate within a preliminary cell. As subsequent cells are infected, random mutations will occur in the viral genome. When these mutations begin to accumulate, antiviral methods will kill the wild type strain, but will not be able to kill one or many mutated forms of the original virus. At this point a resistance mutation has occurred because the new strain of virus is now resistant to the antiviral treatment that would have killed the original virus. Resistance mutations are evident and widely studied in HIV due to its high rate of mutation and prevalence in the general population. Resistance mutation is now studied in bacteriology and parasitology.
Ibalizumab, sold under the brand name Trogarzo, is a non-immunosuppressive humanised monoclonal antibody that binds CD4, the primary receptor for HIV, and inhibits HIV from entering cells. It is a post-attachment inhibitor, blocking HIV from binding to the CCR5 and CXCR4 co-receptors after HIV binds to the CD4 receptor on the surface of a CD4 cell. Post-attachment inhibitors are a subclass of HIV drugs called entry inhibitors.
Non-nucleoside reverse-transcriptase inhibitors (NNRTIs) are antiretroviral drugs used in the treatment of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). NNRTIs inhibit reverse transcriptase (RT), an enzyme that controls the replication of the genetic material of HIV. RT is one of the most popular targets in the field of antiretroviral drug development.
Many major physiological processes depend on regulation of proteolytic enzyme activity and there can be dramatic consequences when equilibrium between an enzyme and its substrates is disturbed. In this prospective, the discovery of small-molecule ligands, like protease inhibitors, that can modulate catalytic activities has an enormous therapeutic effect. Hence, inhibition of the HIV protease is one of the most important approaches for the therapeutic intervention in HIV infection and their development is regarded as major success of structure-based drug design. They are highly effective against HIV and have, since the 1990s, been a key component of anti-retroviral therapies for HIV/AIDS.
HIV drug resistance occurs when microevolution causes virions to become tolerant to antiretroviral treatments (ART). ART can be used to successfully manage HIV infection, but a number of factors can contribute to the virus mutating and becoming resistant. Drug resistance occurs as bacterial or viral populations evolve to no longer respond to medications that previously worked. In the case of HIV, there have been recognized cases of treatment resistant strains since 1989, with drug resistance being a major contributor to treatment failure. While global incidence varies greatly from region to region, there has been a general increase in overall HIV drug resistance. The two main types of resistance, primary and induced, differ mostly in causation, with the biggest cause of resistance being a lack of adherence to the specific details of treatment. These newly created resistant strains of HIV pose a public health issue as they infect a growing number of people because they are harder to treat, and can be spread to other individuals. For this reason, the reaction to the growing number of cases of resistant HIV strains has mostly been to try to increase access to treatment and implement other measures to make sure people stay in care, as well as to look into the development of an HIV vaccine or cure.
HIV Resistance Response Database Initiative (RDI) is a not-for-profit organisation established in 2002 which states its mission as "To improve the clinical management of HIV infection by developing a large clinical database and bioinformatic techniques that predict accurately any individual's response to any combination of HIV drugs."
Discovery and development of nucleoside and nucleotide reverse-transcriptase inhibitors began in the 1980s when the AIDS epidemic hit Western societies. NRTIs inhibit the reverse transcriptase (RT), an enzyme that controls the replication of the genetic material of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). The first NRTI was zidovudine, approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in 1987, which was the first step towards treatment of HIV. Six NRTI agents and one NtRTI have followed. The NRTIs and the NtRTI are analogues of endogenous 2´-deoxy-nucleoside and nucleotide. Drug-resistant viruses are an inevitable consequence of prolonged exposure of HIV-1 to anti-HIV drugs.
The Berlin patient is an anonymous person from Berlin, Germany, who was described in 1998 as exhibiting prolonged "post-treatment control" of HIV viral load after HIV treatments were interrupted.
HIV/AIDS research includes all medical research that attempts to prevent, treat, or cure HIV/AIDS, as well as fundamental research about the nature of HIV as an infectious agent and AIDS as the disease caused by HIV.
Deborah Persaud is a Guyanese-born American virologist who primarily works on HIV/AIDS at Johns Hopkins Children's Center.
Fostemsavir, sold under the brand name Rukobia, is an antiretroviral medication for adults living with HIV/AIDS who have tried multiple HIV medications and whose HIV infection cannot be successfully treated with other therapies because of resistance, intolerance or safety considerations.
Treatment as prevention (TasP) is a concept in public health that promotes treatment as a way to prevent and reduce the likelihood of HIV illness, death and transmission from an infected individual to others. Expanding access to earlier HIV diagnosis and treatment as a means to address the global epidemic by preventing illness, death and transmission was first proposed in 2000 by Garnett et al. The term is often used to talk about treating people that are currently living with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS) to prevent illness, death and transmission. Although some experts narrow this to only include preventing infections, treatment prevents illnesses such as tuberculosis and has been shown to prevent death. The dual impact on well-being and its 100% effectiveness in reducing transmission makes TasP the most important element in the HIV prevention toolkit. In relation to HIV, antiretroviral therapy (ART) is a three or more drug combination therapy that is used to decrease the viral load, or the measured amount of virus, in an infected individual. Such medications are used as a preventative for infected individuals to not only spread the HIV virus to their negative partners but also improve their current health to increase their lifespans. Other names for ART include highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART), combination antiretroviral therapy (cART), triple therapy and triple drug cocktail. When taken correctly, ART is able to diminish the presence of the HIV virus in the bodily fluids of an infected person to a level of undetectability. Undetectability ensures that infection does not necessarily have an effect on a person's general health, and that there is no longer a risk of passing along HIV to others. Consistent adherence to an ARV regimen, monitoring, and testing are essential for continued confirmed viral suppression. Treatment as prevention rose to great prominence in 2011, as part of the HPTN 052 study, which shed light on the benefits of early treatment for HIV positive individuals.
Bictegravir/emtricitabine/tenofovir alafenamide, sold under the brand name Biktarvy, is a fixed-dose combination antiretroviral medication for the treatment of HIV/AIDS. One tablet, taken orally once daily, contains 50 mg bictegravir, 200 mg emtricitabine, and 25 mg tenofovir alafenamide. It was approved for use in the United States in February 2018, and for use in the European Union in June 2018.
Professor Ravindra "Ravi" Kumar Gupta is a professor of clinical microbiology at the Cambridge Institute of Therapeutic Immunology and Infectious Disease at the University of Cambridge. He is also a member of the faculty of the Africa Health Research Institute in Durban, South Africa.
References
- ↑ "Jolly Lab - Members". UCL. Archived from the original on 11 June 2016.
- ↑ The Use of Benznidazole in Treating Chagas' Disease at the Non-vector Transmitted Region : A Literature Review and Study Design (2010). Web.
- ↑ "UCL Jolly Lab Members". Archived from the original on 11 June 2016.
- ↑ "The Ethical Riddles In HIV Research". Ted Talks. 10 January 2013.
- ↑ "Scholar gives TED talk of the day". Commonwealth Scholarship. 11 January 2013. Archived from the original on 9 October 2018.
- ↑ "Who are the 100 Women 2014?". 26 October 2014. Retrieved 26 February 2019.
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