New research led by a team from Oregon Health and Science University has revealed that the US outbreak of West African monkeypox virus was larger than was previously thought. Additionally, cross-protective immunity against West African monkeypox gained following smallpox vaccination can potentially be maintained for decades. Although other studies that have been discussed in this column linked the survival of infected individuals during the 2003 US outbreak of monkeypox to the reduced virulence of the infecting monkeypox strain, this latest research asserts that the West African monkeypox strain is not less virulent than the Congo basin isolate. Instead, individuals might have been protected by prior smallpox vaccination. Mark Slifka, who led the study, commented ?In our study, we found one subject who had fully protective immunity that was maintained for 48 years after a single smallpox vaccination?. In Africa, those vaccinated against smallpox rarely succumb to monkeypox. Nature Med.

One of the problems of using HAART to treat HIV infection is that it only targets actively replicating virus, and so HIV that lies dormant in cells is difficult to eradicate. The latest drug to be mooted as a potential solution to the problem of latent virus infection is valproic acid, a licensed anti-convulsant that specifically inhibits an enzyme involved in maintaining latency in CD4+ T cells, one of the main reservoirs of latent virus. Research led by David Margolis of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill revealed that valproic acid can partly purge latently infected cells of HIV virus. Talk of a cure is premature, however, as the sample of individuals treated was small and the reduction in latently infected cells was only 75%. Ideally, almost all, if not all, of the latently infected cells would need to be removed to enable drug treatments to cure infected individuals of HIV. Lancet

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