Advances in antiretroviral therapy (ART) now allow people living with HIV to lead normal lives with undetectable and nontransmissible levels of the virus in their blood. Yet that reality is limited to those with access to treatment. More than 40 million people worldwide live with HIV, with over a million new infections and hundreds of thousands of deaths each year, underscoring that major challenges remain.

Nchroma Bio Inc. has received a certificate for clinical trial in Hong Kong to initiate a first-in-human phase I/II trial of CRMA-1001 for the treatment of chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection. Dosing is expected to begin early next year.

Two new therapies are now FDA approved to treat the sexually transmitted infection gonorrhea, with Innoviva Inc.’s Nuzolvence (zoliflodacin) and GSK plc’s Blujepa (gepotidacin) offering additional antibiotic options comparable to standard of care. Both products had fast track, qualified infectious disease product and priority review designations.

Orthoflaviruses such as dengue, West Nile and Zika viruses are a threat to public health for which no specific treatments exist. Their protease NS2B-NS3, also called orthoflavivirin, is an attractive drug target because it is essential for virus maturation. Targeting viral proteases has already proven effective for creating drugs against HIV, hepatitis C and SARS-CoV-2 viruses.

The cardiomyositis that is a rare adverse effect of mRNA-based COVID vaccines is due to immune cell activity as a result of increased levels of the chemokines CXCL10 and interferon-γ (IFN-γ). Blocking CXCL10 and IFN-γ could prevent muscle cell damage in cell culture, and cardiomyositis in animal models. The findings, reported in the Dec. 10, 2025, issue of Science Translational Medicine, suggest a way of mitigating the risk of cardiomyositis.

Restricting the recommended use of COVID-19 vaccines in the U.S. wasn’t enough. Now the Children’s Health Defense (CHD) is trying to get the FDA to revoke the BLAs for all versions of the Moderna Inc. and Pfizer Inc.-Biontech SE COVID-19 vaccines.

Many cases of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-1 infection can be effectively treated with existing drugs, but they can lose efficacy over time because of the emergence of resistance. In an effort to generate next-generation drugs, Chinese researchers at the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences & Peking Union Medical College and other institutions synthesized a series of peptidomimetics against the viral protease, in which they extended the therapeutically effective hydroxyethyl sulfonamide scaffold using an amino acid linker. They reasoned that the linker could allow the drug to make additional contacts with the protease.

Researchers from the Università degli Studi di Napoli Federico II and collaborators described the antibacterial activity of N-19004, an antagonist of formyl peptide receptor 1 (FPR1).