Natural Herpes Treatment

Herpes News:

A study published on March 26 in PLoS Pathogens descibes a  protein, called VP16, which acts as the gatekeeper for the damaging, infective activity of the herpes virus. Mice were infected with herpes virus carrying a mutated, inactive form of VP16. After the initial infection had faded, the researchers stressed the mice by raising body temperature and watched to see how many mice had a recurrence of a viral outbreak. Stress did not reactivate the virus in these mice.

But in mice infected with herpes carrying the functional form of VP16 did come back, suggesting that VP16 is the key to reactivation.

In addition to pinpointing VP16 as a key player in reawakening the virus, the new study also shows that the VP16 gene becomes active much earlier in the reactivation than in the initial infection. The VP16 protein is made by the active gene in a small number of neurons, which is enough to begin the cascade of infectivity anew. “This paper comes back to say VP16 is the first triggering event,” Triezenberg says.

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New research may open the way to permanently kill the herpes virus buy activating the dormant virus then destroying it.

“Inactive virus is completely untouchable by any treatment we have. Unless you activate the virus, you can’t kill it,” said Bryan Cullen, who oversaw the research.

Jennifer Lin Umbach of Duke University in North Carolina said that for still unknown reasons, viruses infecting different neurons in the same body activate at different times, making it impossible to eradicate an infection.

Her team found that a gene called LAT controls microRNAs that turn off other genes in the virus.

A drug that would turn off the microRNAs could drive the virus out of hiding and allow all copies of the virus to be killed with acyclovir, she said.

“You would have one cold sore but you would get rid of it,” she said. Curing something more painful, such as shingles, might be a little trickier, she added.

The potential market is large. An estimated one in five Americans have genital herpes (HSV-2) according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, while 100 million have the HSV-1 virus that causes cold sores.

Whether or not this new research reveals a  way to cure herpes by activating the dormant virus, you can do something about herpes outbreaks today. Visit this page.