Journal Article

Combating Lassa Fever in West African Sub-Region: Progress, Challenges, and Future Perspectives

Orji, Obasi Uche, Emelike, Chinedum Uche, Aloke, Chinyere, Egwu, Chinedu Ogbonnia, Achilonu, Ikechukwu, Aja, Patrick Maduabuchi, Obasi, Nwogo Ajuka, Jeje, Olamide, Onisuru, Olalekan Olugbenga, Edeogu, Chuks Oswald

2023

Overview

Lassa fever (LF) is a rodent-borne disease that threatens human health in the sub-region of West Africa where the zoonotic host of Lassa virus (LASV) is predominant. Currently, treatment options for LF are limited and since no preventive vaccine is approved for its infectivity, there is a high mortality rate in endemic areas. This narrative review explores the transmission, pathogenicity of LASV, advances, and challenges of different treatment options. Our findings indicate that genetic diversity among the different strains of LASV and their ability to circumvent the immune system poses a critical challenge to the development of LASV vaccines/therapeutics. Thus, understanding the biochemistry, physiology and genetic polymorphism of LASV, mechanism of evading host immunity are essential for development of effective LASV vaccines/therapeutics to combat this lethal viral disease. The LASV nucleoprotein (NP) is a novel target for therapeutics as it functions significantly in several aspects of the viral life cycle. Consequently, LASV NP inhibitors could be employed as effective therapeutics as they will potentially inhibit LASV replication. Effective preventive control measures, vaccine development, target validation, and repurposing of existing drugs, such as ribavirin, using activity or in silico-based and computational bioinformatics, would aid in the development of novel drugs for LF management.

• Publisher: MDPI AG,MDPI
• Subject: Africa, Western - epidemiology / Antiviral drugs / Asymptomatic / Bioinformatics / Computer applications / Drug development / Epidemics / Epidemiology / Fatalities / Fever / Gene polymorphism / Genetic diversity / genetic polymorphism / genetic variation / human health / Humans / Immune system / immunity / Immunosuppressive agents / Infections / Infectious diseases / Infectivity / Lassa Fever / Lassa mammarenavirus / Lassa virus / Lassa virus fever / Life cycles / Mortality / nucleoprotein / nucleoproteins / Pathogenicity / physiology / R&D / Research & development / Review / Ribavirin / target validation / therapeutics / Vaccine development / Vaccines / Viral diseases / Viral Vaccines / Virus Replication / Viruses / Western Africa