Canadian Scientists Discover Drug Against Flu Virus

A new, more effective substance that can destroy the influenza virus was found by Canadian scientists. Simon Fraser University virologist Masahiro Niikura and his doctoral student Nicole Bance are among an international group of scientists that has discovered a new class of molecular compounds capable of killing the influenza virus.

Working on the premise that too much of a good thing can be a killer, the scientists have advanced previous researchers' methods of manipulating an enzyme that is key to how influenza replicates and spreads, reports Science Daily.

Their new compounds will lead to a new generation of anti-influenza drugs that the virus' strains can't adapt to, and resist, as easily as they do Tamiflu.

It's an anti-influenza drug that is becoming less effective against the constantly mutating flu virus.

The journal Science Express has just published online the scientists' study, revealing how to use their newly discovered compounds to interrupt the enzyme neuraminidase's facilitation of influenza's spread.

The new compounds are also more effective because they're water-soluble.

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"They reach the patient's throat where the flu virus is replicating after being taken orally," said Niikura, a Faculty of Health Sciences associate professor.

Source-IANS