Description: The central mystery of hepatitis C now is solved. A new finding promises more effective, shorter, and easier hepatitis C treatments. What Michael Gale Jr., PhD, and colleagues discovered is how hepatitis C virus establishes lifelong infection. They found that the virus makes a key that lets it turn off a cell's anti-virus machinery. And they found that a type of drug -- already in development by several companies -- robs the virus of this key. Without it, the anti-viral machinery comes to life. It churns out a chemical called interferon that rids the cell of the hepatitis C virus.