**5. Antiviral therapeutic approaches to encephalitis caused by measles virus infection of the central nervous nystem: SSPE and MIBE**

Multiple therapeutic agents, including Interferons, Ribavirine, Isoprinosine, vitamin A have been used to treat measles complications, including SSPE and MIBE, but benefit has been transient at best. Today there is not antiviral therapy of proven efficacy for MV. We will briefly review past experience, some times necessarily anecdotal, given the low frequency and highly variable course of these diseases that hinder controlled clinical trials. We will discuss new potential anti-MV therapies including, RNA interference, inhibitors of virus entry and MV RNA polymerase, (reviews by Garg, 2008; Pempler & Snyder, 2009; Reuter & Schneider-Schaulies, 2010) and a novel therapeutic approaches including selective induction of apoptosis in MV infected cells as a potential early treatment of SSPE and MIBE.
