Updates on Dengue Vaccine and Antiviral: Where Are We Heading?

Abstract

Approximately 100–400 million people from more than 100 countries in the tropical and subtropical world are affected by dengue infections. Recent scientific breakthroughs have brought new insights into novel strategies for the production of dengue antivirals and vaccines. The search for specific dengue inhibitors is expanding, and the mechanisms for evaluating the efficacy of novel drugs are currently established, allowing for expedited translation into human trials. Furthermore, in the aftermath of the only FDA-approved vaccine, Dengvaxia, a safer and more effective dengue vaccine candidate is making its way through the clinical trials. Until an effective antiviral therapy and licensed vaccine are available, disease monitoring and vector population control will be the mainstays of dengue prevention. In this article, we highlighted recent advances made in the perspectives of efforts made recently, in dengue vaccine development and dengue antiviral drug.

Roles of Interleukin-6-mediated immunometabolic reprogramming in COVID-19 and other viral infection-associated diseases

“…Dengue viruses (DV) are a serotype subgroup of flavivirus in flaviviridae that are transmitted by vector insects such as aedes aegypti and aedes albopictus [154] . Upon infection, DV first replicate in capillary endothelial cells, and amplified DV are then released into blood stream to form viremia and further infect monocyte-macrophages in blood and tissues, causing dengue fever [155] . DV-infected cells can produce protective pro-inflammatory cytokine IL-6, which attracts and activates leukocytes in the infection sites, promotes inflammatory response of macrophages, and induces B cell maturation [156] , [157] ( Fig.…”

Dengue virus NS4B protein as a target for developing antivirals

“…Although NS4B is a membrane protein which is challenging to set up in vitro assays to explore protein-inhibitor interactions, several NS4B inhibitors have been developed using phenotypic screening ( Fikatas et al., 2021 ). The progress in developing NS4B inhibitors have been reviewed and highlighted ( Xie et al., 2015 ; Ye et al., 2016 ; Lim, 2019 ; Behnam and Klein, 2021 ; Biering and Harris, 2021 ; Norshidah et al., 2021 ). A few NS4B inhibitors are described here ( Figure 3 ; Table 1 ).…”

Antiviral Agents against Flavivirus Protease: Prospect and Future Direction

“…It remains a challenge for the scientific community to develop a DENV vaccine that simultaneously elicits a balanced tetravalent immunity against all four DENV serotypes. In 2019, the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the live-attenuated, tetravalent vaccine, Dengvaxia (from Sanofi Pasteur), but only for individuals living in endemic areas between 9–16 years of age with prior DENV infection [ 15 , 16 ]. These challenges increase the demand to develop therapeutics and vaccines that target different flaviviruses.…”