The Wellcome Trust has awarded €2.8 million for research into new treatments for dengue fever at KU Leuven. Dengue fever, or 'breakbone fever' as it is sometimes called, is widespread in tropical and subtropical regions of the world, but as yet there are no vaccines or cures for the disease, which is caused by infection with the dengue virus.
Researchers at the Laboratory for Virology and Experimental Chemotherapy, the Rega Institute and the Centre for Drug Design and Discovery at KU Leuven will receive the funding as part of Wellcome’s Seeding Drug Discovery initiative, a £91 million fund that aims to develop new drugs in areas of unmet medical need.
According to the World Health Organisation approximately 50 to 100 million people are infected with the dengue virus every year. Currently, the only way to counteract the spread of dengue is to exterminate the mosquitoes that carry the virus.
The research will be led by Johan Neyts of the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at the Rega Institute, which specialises particularly in antiviral research.
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