Antivirals
Herpes, influenza, HIV and hepatitis — hitting a hijacker that lives inside our cells.
Antivirals: Herpes & Influenza
A virus is the ultimate hijacker — it has almost no machinery of its own, using your cells to make copies of itself. So how do you poison the virus without poisoning the cell it hides in? The answer is one of the most elegant tricks in all of pharmacology: a drug that stays harmless everywhere in your body EXCEPT inside a virus-infected cell, where the virus itself unwittingly switches it on.
HIV Antiretrovirals: From Death Sentence to Daily Pill
In one generation, HIV went from an almost certain death sentence to a manageable chronic condition controlled by a single daily pill — one of the greatest triumphs in the history of medicine. The secret wasn't a single wonder drug, but a strategy: attack the virus at several stages of its life cycle at once. Understand that life cycle, and every class of HIV drug falls into place.
Hepatitis B & C Antivirals: One We Suppress, One We Cure
Two viruses attack the same organ, yet our drugs treat them in opposite ways. Hepatitis B we can suppress but rarely eliminate — a lifelong daily pill that keeps the virus quiet. Hepatitis C, once a slow road to cirrhosis, we now cure outright in a couple of months. The contrast is one of the most instructive stories in antiviral medicine.
