Protease inhibitors (PIs) are a class of antiviral drugs that are widely used to treat HIV/AIDS and hepatitis C. Protease inhibitors prevent viral replication by selectively binding to viral proteases (e.g. HIV-1 protease) and blocking proteolytic cleavage of protein precursors that are necessary for the production of infectious viral particles.
Protease inhibitors that have been developed and are currently used in clinical practice include:
Given the specificity of the target of these drugs there is the risk, as in antibiotics, of the development of drug-resistant mutated viruses. To reduce this risk it is common to use several different drugs together that are each aimed at different targets.
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