A recent study showed that activation of signal transducer and activator of transcription 3 (STAT-3), a potent cellular transcription factor that is up-regulated independently during both KSHV and EBV infections, can suppress lytic replication of KSHV through the suppression of KSHV-RTA promoter (Lui et al., 2009; King et al., 2015). The gene discussed is STAT3; the disease is Epstein-Barr virus infection.