NIAID Funds HTS efforts at RetroVirox to discover anti-viral agents against Lassa Fever virus
NIAID Funds HTS efforts at RetroVirox to discover anti-viral agents against Lassa Fever virus
January 14, 2013
San Diego, March 12, 2015 - RetroVirox Inc. a Biotechnology announced today that it is the recipient of a $600,000 grant award from the National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) to carry out a high throughput screen (HTS) to identify small-molecules with activity against highly pathogenic arenaviruses.
The ultimate goal of this proposal is the identification of antivirals against Lassa Fever, a neglected disease endemic of Western Africa caused by the virus with the same name (LASV). Lassa fever is estimated to infect from 300,000 to 500,000 humans every year, causing 5,000 to 10,000 deaths annually. There are no vaccines against the virus and the only treatment available is the use of ribavirin, a nonspecific antiviral agent with many known side effects. The fatality rate among Lassa fever hospitalized patients is 10 to 20 percent. By comparison, fatality rates for Ebola, another hemorrhagic viruses are in the 50 to 70% range. However, given the much larger prevalence of Lassa, the burden of disease caused by Lassa virus is much larger, which can be the most common cause of death in some afflicted areas.
During this 2-year Phase I Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) grant award, RetroVirox will first optimize a cell-based assay to identify small-molecules with antiviral activity against lymphocytic choriomeningitis virus (LCMV), a prototypic member of the Old Arenaviruses. Lassa fever virus also belongs to the Old Arenavirus family. “LCMV causes a relatively non-symptomatic infection and this virus can be safely handled under relaxed Biosafety conditions.....” said Dr. Juan Lama, Chief Scientific Officer of RetroVirox “.....after the assay is engineered we anticipate to screen over 50,000 molecules at our San Diego facilities, and then those molecules with proven anti-LCMV activity will be tested for anti-Lassa activity under a Biosafety Level 4 (BSL4) laboratory containment”. Only a handful of such BSL4 labs operate in the United States.
An specific antiviral against Lassa Fever virus could save thousands of lives in affected regions and also help to stop the spread of the virus outside the endemic African areas where Lassa virus is common. Lassa fever cases in people traveling outside Western Africa have already been detected in the United States.