from Jean-Michel Pawlotsky writing in Hepatitis C: Antiviral Drug Discovery and Development:
In the last decade, insights into the virology of hepatitis C virus (HCV) have unraveled several targets for potential novel therapeutics that, unlike interferon (IFN)-alpha and ribavirin, are specifically targeted to HCV. Many such direct-acting antiviral (DAA) drugs are at the preclinical developmental stage and several are in clinical development. Initial clinical trials using some of these inhibitors, either alone or in combination with pegylated IFN-alpha and ribavirin, have yielded encouraging results.
Further reading: Hepatitis C: Antiviral Drug Discovery and Development