New Malaria Drug Is More Effective

A new drug of new class for malaria is likely to hit market. Laboratory tests have found an experimental drug kills malaria drug resistance. If successful, the drug would be the first new drug in around 30 years to treat malaria.

Scientists claimed on Journal Science, even little dose of the drug showed equivalent effects as that of the current drug in market. An experiment was done on mice. Researchers found that it killed the strains of malaria drug-resistant.

Researches are being made across the world by scientists for effective cure of malaria. The efforts are followed by a report that says present drugs have become ineffective. And even the most powerful medicines are falling short for curing malaria as patients have developed drug resistance. The efforts are intended to stop spreading malaria from African countries to other countries.

Being the 3rd most infectious disease, more than 250M people get infected with malaria every year. WHO report suggests 890,000 dies of malaria. Malaria is wide spread disease in African countries.

It’s been over 30 years that a new drug is invented for malaria. Since present drugs have been found vulnerable, a strong need is being felt for a new drug which can withstand and cure new drug-resistance for malaria.

The drug is the result of more than three years of work by almost 30 scientists in five countries. Researchers at a Novartis lab in San Diego sifted through 12,000 chemical compounds starting in 2006, finding 275 that had an impact on the deadliest species of the parasite that causes malaria, according to the study.

The research involves 30 scientists headed by Diagana of Novartis at San Diego, USA. Clinical trials on humans are expected to be started at the end of year.

The most recent drug for curing malaria is Malarone launched in 2001. Malarone is most effective drug for P.Falciparum malaria, the deadliest form of malaria, so far.