An assistant holds a test tube with an Aedes aegypti mosquito at the CNEA (National Atomic Energy Commission), in Ezeiza, in the outskirts of Buenos Aires, Argentina April 12, 2023. (Photo: REUTERS/Agustin Marcarian/File Photo)

There are currently no specific treatments for dengue, a growing disease threat, the company said ahead of presentation of the data at the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene Annual Meeting in Chicago. 

“It is the first ever to show antiviral activity against dengue,” Marnix Van Loock, who oversees emerging pathogens research for J&J’s Janssen division, said of the drug. 

Dengue fever has long been a scourge across much of Asia and Latin America, causing millions of infections each year and tens of thousands of deaths, and is likely to spread further as climate change makes more areas hospitable for the mosquitoes that spread it, according to the World Health Organization.