Abstract

Influenza virus causes annual epidemics and occasional pandemics despite developing new vaccines and antiviral drugs, thus presents significant public health concerns. For efficient treatment of influenza, researchers have shown interest on drugs with pleiotropic effects. Clinical efficacy of all conventional drugs in this case is ambiguous. Atorvastatin as a common drug used to treat hypercholestrolemia can block downstream processes in cholesterol biosynthesis pathway such that some of them are important supporting factors for the virus infectivity. To study antiviral potential of atorvastatin, the cells were treated with effective concentration (EC₅₀) of atorvastatin in vicinity of 100 tissue culture infectious dose (100TCID₅₀) of the virus sample during infection in different exposure types and the cell viability and the viral titers were examined. The results showed that atorvastatin in combination treatment with virus, reduced the virus infectivity by decreasing the virus titer and increasing the cell viability in comparison with the virus treatment. The experiment demonstrated significant anti-influenza properties of atorvastatin in cell culture probably by inhibiting the early stage of multiplication. Atorvastatin might be a good option as alternative to other chemical drugs in upcoming pandemics.

Key words: Atorvastatin, influenza virus, antiviral potential, MTT assay, hemagglutination assay.