Safety Assessment of Antiviral Drugs

Abstract

Over the past two decades, accumulating knowledge of viral replication and viral/host cell interaction has made it possible to define virus specific events that are unique and to identify compounds that have the potential to interfere with these events. The available new antiviral agents have already impacted upon the treatment of several viral illnesses and more are under development. With the advent of compounds that interrupt or interfere with events at the genomic level, questions have been raised regarding the safety of these compounds as well as the adequacy of the available test systems to evaluate safety. Just as the field of antiviral drug therapy is young and evolving, so too are the methods used to assess their associated risk.