title: Hepatitis C virus therapies: current treatments, targets and future perspectives.
abstract: Chronic hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection is the cause of an emerging global epidemic of chronic liver disease. Current combination therapies are at best 80% efficacious and are often poorly tolerated. Strategies to improve the therapeutic response include the development of novel interferons, nucleoside analogues with reduced haemolysis compared with ribavirin and inosine 5'-monophosphate dehydrogenase inhibitors. Compounds in preclinical or early clinical trials include small molecules that inhibit virus-specific enzymes (such as the serine proteases, RNA polymerase and helicase) or interfere with translation (including anti-sense molecules, iRNA and ribozymes). Advances in understanding HCV replication, obtaining a sub-genomic replicon and contriving potential small animal models, in addition to solving crystallographic structures for the replication enzymes, have improved prospects for developing novel therapies. This review summarizes current and evolving treatments for chronic hepatitis C infection. In addition, progress in HCV targets and drug discovery tools valuable in the search for novel anti-HCV agents is detailed.
authors.affiliation: Ribapharm Inc., Hyland Avenue, Costa Mesa, Calif., USA.
authors.forename: Michelle P
authors.initials: MP
authors.lastname: Walker
authors.forename: Todd C
authors.initials: TC
authors.lastname: Appleby
authors.forename: Weidong
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Zhong
authors.forename: Johnson Y N
authors.initials: JY
authors.lastname: Lau
authors.forename: Zhi
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Hong
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D000998:Antiviral Agents / Q000737:chemistry / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D002986:Clinical Trials as Topic; D004195:Disease Models, Animal; D015195:Drug Design; D004359:Drug Therapy, Combination; D004791:Enzyme Inhibitors / Q000627:therapeutic use; D016174:Hepacivirus / Q000187:drug effects*; D019698:Hepatitis C, Chronic / Q000188:drug therapy* / Q000517:prevention & control; D006801:Humans; D016898:Interferon-alpha / Q000627:therapeutic use; D011994:Recombinant Proteins / Q000627:therapeutic use; D012254:Ribavirin / Q000627:therapeutic use
chemical_list: D000998:Antiviral Agents; D004791:Enzyme Inhibitors; D016898:Interferon-alpha; D011994:Recombinant Proteins; D012254:Ribavirin