Vaccines and antibiotic treatments have generated amazing successes in our battle against infectious diseases. However, diseases such as AIDS and SARS emerge, while diseases such as tuberculosis continue to be important public health problems. Thus we need to identify new means and approaches to deal with infectious diseases. One promising approach against pathogens is to use drug combinations, borrowing from a strategy that works so well against HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. While single compounds proved ineffective because HIV develops resistance so rapidly, the simultaneous use of several drugs that target different viral processes changes HIV infection from a death sentence to a chronic disease-less than an ideal outcome, but a great improvement for the patient.
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