PMC:2700745 / 55657-56986 JSONTXT

{"target":"https://pubannotation.org/docs/sourcedb/PMC/sourceid/2700745","sourcedb":"PMC","sourceid":"2700745","source_url":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/2700745","text":"As shown in this review, several species of laboratory animals have proved to be very useful for research on influenza. Mice, particularly the BALB/c strain, are currently intensively employed for studying pathogenesis, for demonstrating the efficacy of antiviral drugs, and for preliminary efficacy studies for vaccines. Studies with antiviral agents have shown the infection in mice to be predictive of efficacy in humans. For example, all of the currently approved drugs for treating influenza virus infections were first shown to be efficacious in mice. Although mice are not readily susceptible to newly isolated human seasonal influenza viruses and require virus adaptation, many highly pathogenic avian influenza strains require no adaptation and readily infect mice to cause lethal disease. Mice also do not exhibit some of the clinical symptoms detected in humans such as nasal exudate, fever, sneezing, and coughing. However, many clinical signs that seem to markers of disease severity can be measured in mice to study influenza disease, such as saturated oxygen levels, virus lung titers, cytokine levels, serum and acute phase proteins. In addition, the use of mouse models enable the investigator to rapidly evaluate the efficacy of antiviral agents and vaccines at relatively lesser costs than other animal models.","tracks":[]}