Assessment of the anti-viral effect of a short-term oral treatment of mice with live Saccharomyces cerevisiae cells.
For assessing the efficacy of antiviral treatments, influenza and herpes virus HSV-1 infections of varying degrees of severity have been produced. The infections proved to be reproducible with respect to both their course and death rate. These infections also exhibited a course slow enough to permit the assessment of treatments under conditions mimicking human infections and lent themselves to the choice of the best adapted strategy to treat an infection. A short-term oral treatment with live cells of S. cerevisiae was efficacious in protecting mice against mild influenza infection and partly but significantly against severe infection. On the other hand, it did not afford significant protection towards either mild or severe HSV-1 infections, but it significantly potentiated the effectiveness of the antiviral drug vidarabin. S. cerevisiae treatment induced the synthesis of IFN alpha but not that of TNF alpha.
Fattal-German
M
M
Unité de Toxinologie Moléculaire, Institut Pasteur, Paris, France.
Bizzini
B
B
D000276:Adjuvants, Immunologic / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D000284:Administration, Oral; D000547:Amantadine / Q000627:therapeutic use; D000818:Animals; D000998:Antiviral Agents / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D003131:Combined Modality Therapy; D005260:Female; D006561:Herpes Simplex / Q000188:drug therapy / Q000628:therapy*; D009980:Influenza A virus; D051379:Mice; D009976:Orthomyxoviridae Infections / Q000188:drug therapy / Q000628:therapy*; D012441:Saccharomyces cerevisiae; D014740:Vidarabine / Q000627:therapeutic use
D000276:Adjuvants, Immunologic; D000998:Antiviral Agents; D000547:Amantadine; D014740:Vidarabine