antiviral therapy

Syllable breakdown

Dictionary meaning

the medical treatment of viral infections using pharmacological agents that target specific steps in the viral replication cycle, such as nucleoside analogues that mimic the building blocks of viral nucleic acids and terminate chain elongation, protease inhibitors that prevent cleavage of viral polyproteins into functional components, or neuraminidase inhibitors that prevent newly assembled influenza virions from budding from the host cell surface; unlike antibiotics, which have broad applicability across bacterial species, most antiviral agents are highly specific to particular viral families or species, reflecting the close integration of viral replication machinery with host cell processes that limits therapeutic targeting options