‘Antibiotic for viruses’ in pipeline

ASINGLE drug that fights off flu, Ebola, yellow fever and other killer viruses could soon be available, thanks to a British breakthrough. Described as “an antibiotic for viruses”, the multi-purpose medicine would be able to treat and even prevent infection.

Importantly, it would be the first to be effective against many different types of viruses.

Unlike antibiotics, which tend to zap a range of different bacteria, existing anti-viral drugs only work against one bug.

Researcher Paul Kellam, of the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute near Cambridge, said: “This has very real implications. This will prevent influenza viruses, dengue viruses, yellow fever viruses, Ebola viruses, among others, from getting into cells.”

The drug has become a possibility thanks to Kellam’s discovery of a gene that makes some people extra susceptible to severe flu.

The hundreds of thousands of Britons with the rogue DNA are four times as likely as normal to develop illness so serious it could put them in hospital or even kill them. The IFITM3 gene makes a compound that stops the flu virus from invading the body’s cells. Those with a faulty gene don’t make enough of this protein and the bug finds it easier to take hold. The key now will be to make a drug that raises levels of the compound in the body.

This could be used to treat or even prevent flu in those with the flawed gene. It may even be possible to help “normal” people recover more quickly.

Although flu is often thought of as a minor inconvenience, it can be deadly, killing up to 12 000 Britons each year, many of them elderly. Other options include testing people for the rogue gene, and during a flu outbreak, those with the faulty gene could be fast-tracked to more powerful treatment.

The drug should also protect against other viruses that use the same mechanism as flu to invade cells, including the Ebola virus as well as dengue fever, a tropical illness that claims up to 25 000 lives a year, and yellow fever, which kills up to 30 000. Although the medicine has yet to be formulated, Kellam is confident it will be possible. He told the British Science Festival in Bradford that the “antibiotic for viruses” could be just five to 10 years away.