Patent ID: 7419964

Claim:
A topical composition for the treatment of HSV-related pathologies comprising: (a) a single-stranded DNA (ssDNA) expression vector, other than plasmids pssXE and pssXV, having a gene encoding for a reverse transcriptase (RT) and a ssDNA expression cassette comprising in 5′ to 3′ order: (i) a cytomegalovirus (CMV) or Rous Sarcoma virus (RSV) promoter sequence, (ii) an inverted tandem repeat (IR) sequence, (iii) a sequence of interest comprising SEQ ID NO: 4, and (iv) a mammalian reverse transcriptase primer binding site (PBS) sequence; and (b) a topical ointment or cream; wherein the ssDNA so produced has minimal flanking sequence.