title: Towards antiviral therapies for treating dengue virus infections.
abstract: Dengue virus is an emerging human pathogen that poses a huge public health burden by infecting annually about 390 million individuals of which a quarter report with clinical manifestations. Although progress has been made in understanding dengue pathogenesis, a licensed vaccine or antiviral therapy against this virus is still lacking. Treatment of patients is confined to symptomatic alleviation and supportive care. The development of dengue therapeutics thus remains of utmost importance. This review focuses on the few molecules that were evaluated in dengue virus-infected patients: balapiravir, chloroquine, lovastatin, prednisolone and celgosivir. The lessons learned from these clinical trials can be very helpful for the design of future trials for the next generation of dengue virus inhibitors.
authors.affiliation: KU Leuven - University of Leuven, Department of Immunology and Microbiology, Virology and Chemotherapy, Rega Institute for Medical Research, Minderbroedersstraat 10, B-3000 Leuven, Belgium.
authors.forename: Suzanne Jf
authors.initials: SJ
authors.lastname: Kaptein
authors.affiliation: KU Leuven - University of Leuven, Department of Immunology and Microbiology, Virology and Chemotherapy, Rega Institute for Medical Research, Minderbroedersstraat 10, B-3000 Leuven, Belgium. Electronic address: Johan.Neyts@kuleuven.be.
authors.forename: Johan
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Neyts
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D000998:Antiviral Agents / Q000494:pharmacology*; D002986:Clinical Trials as Topic / Q000379:methods; D003715:Dengue / Q000188:drug therapy* / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000821:virology; D003716:Dengue Virus / Q000187:drug effects; D015195:Drug Design; D006801:Humans; D011634:Public Health
chemical_list: D000998:Antiviral Agents