Challenges and progress in developing herpesvirus vaccines

The biological complexities of the human herpesviruses and the wide range of diseases that they cause present many difficulties for vaccine development. Until recently, progress towards this aim has been slow; however, advances in immunology and molecular biology have yielded an exciting array of new approaches for vaccination that have shown promise in model systems. This explosion in technology, together with renewed appreciation of the public-health benefits of vaccination, has sparked a resurgence of interest in the development of new vaccines and several are in, or near, clinical trials in humans. These look set to have a major impact on the incidence of herpesvirus diseases in the future.