Researchers Claim New Treatment for Hepatitis C

(May 15, 2008) - Researchers say they have found a new use for an old drug. The drug, Fluvastatin, has been approved since 1993 by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for the treatment of elevated cholesterol (Read about "Cholesterol") in adults. Millions of patients have taken Fluvastatin for cholesterol since then.

In a study of 31 veterans at a Veteran's Administration Medical Center, researchers found that Fluvastatin significantly lowered the viral load, or levels of hepatitis C virus (Read about "Hepatitis C"), for up to six weeks when used alone. Hepatitis C is the disease that claimed the life of baseball great Mickey Mantle.

"This research is the first to demonstrate the antiviral activity of Fluvastatin in human beings infected with hepatitis C, most of whom were non-responders to the standard of care treatment," said Ted Bader, M.D., the principle investigator on the project. The findings appear online in the American Journal of Gastroenterology.

Since Fluvastatin will not completely clear the hepatitis C virus by itself, researchers have started a phase II randomized, controlled trial that combines Fluvastatin with the standard treatment of peg-interferon and ribavirin. They hope to use the combination of medicines to significantly improve the cure rate for hepatitis C. After further required testing and approval, the drug could be available as a new treatment for hepatitis C far sooner than any other anti-hepatitis C drug currently under research and development.

"We need additional drugs to add to this regimen to improve the cure rate," Bader said. "When patients are cured, they feel dramatically better, their health care costs plummet, their risk of liver cancer (Read about "Liver Cancer") drops dramatically, and if they do not have cirrhosis (Read about "Cirrhosis"), they will not need a liver transplant. (Read about "Transplants") Moreover, they are no longer infectious."