This is a drug which is used to treat viral infections and is also known as 3TC, this being an analog of the nucleoside cytidine that acts by inhibiting the reverse transcriptase enzymes of the HIV virus (human immunodeficiency virus) that causes AIDS. By preventing the virus from replicating, it is also used to treat HBV (hepatitis B virus). It is used in the form of 150 and 300 mg tablets. the daily dose is 300mg per day which can be divided into two doses per day.
This drug is the first known optimization of anti-AIDS, AZT or zidovudine, where the electrophile -N3 in position 3 "has been eliminated from the nucleoside, which reduces the adverse effects of AZT by interaction of the electrophile (-N3) with nucleophiles of the human body and in return a group of sulfur has been introduced instead of carbon in position 3.
In September 2014, the Liberian doctor George Logan, announced positive results of treating the viral disease known as Ebola with lamivudine, of fifteen patients who were treated with the antiviral, thirteen of them who received the treatment having less than three days after having manifested the symptoms, they survived the disease and were declared free of Ebola, meanwhile the two remaining cases died from being treated after the fifth day of the symptoms.
Lamivudine was approved in 1995 by as an antiretroviral drug (ARV) to be given by people with the HIV virus. It has been studied in adults and children older than 3 months.
However, lamivudine is initially effective as a monotherapy for HIV infection, resistance develops within 12 weeks of starting treatment. therefore, the optimal use of lamivudine is part of a three-drug regimen. The current directors of the CDC recommend that your prescription be lamivudine with another nucleotide reverse transcriptase inhibitor such as (ZDV, d4t) plus a protease inhibitor or efavirenz to treat HIV infection.
