ViroPharma estimates that every year, Americans get between 400 million and 500 million picornavirus infections that are serious enough to make them feel bad. You do the math. Certainly other drug makers have. However, only one other company appears to be close to ViroPharma for now. However, colds is the least of the reasons why many doctors are so enthusiastic about pleconaril.
Enterovirus infections are occasionally medical emergencies.
Over the past two years, the FDA has allowed the company to dispense pleconaril outside of organized experiments for infections that are life-threatening or especially gruesome. So far, nearly 100 people have been treated this way, often with seemingly spectacular results. For example, the drug has been given to adults with defective immune systems who suffer enterovirus brain infections that simply will not go away. The usual course is inexorably downhill. Doctors say some of these people have fully recovered after a few days of pleconaril.