The novel COVID-19 treatment VV116 is a potential inhibitor of Zika virus.

Abstract

Zika virus (ZIKV) is a mosquito-borne, positive-stranded RNA virus, ZIKV infection during pregnancy threatens pregnancy and fetal health, and it remains a global health threat, there are no clinically approved vaccines or antiviral drugs for the treatment of ZIKV infection. VV116 is an oral drug candidate of nucleoside analog against SARS-CoV-2 that has demonstrated a satisfactory safety and tolerability in healthy subjects. Our study shows for the first time that VV116 has potent activity against ZIKV. We verified that VV116 can inhibit the RNA and protein level of ZIKV in vitro. Importantly, treatment with VV116 significantly enhanced survival and provided protection in ZIKV-infected ICR mice. VV116 acted at the replication stage of viral infection cycle, and exhibited reasonable inhibition of ZIKV replicons. Collectively, the in vitro and in vivo anti-ZIKV activity of VV116 suggests that it is a promising anti-ZIKV drug candidate.