Artemisinin News and Research

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Artemisinin is a drug used to treat multi-drug resistant strains of falciparum malaria. The compound (a sesquiterpene lactone) is isolated from the plant Artemisia annua. Not all plants of this species contain artemisinin.

Researchers demonstrate how Plasmodium falciparum can able to circumvent action of artemisinin

Researchers from CNRS, INSERM and Toulouse University Hospital have demonstrated how the parasite Plasmodium falciparum, which causes severe forms of malaria, is able to circumvent the action of artemisinin and its derivatives, which are today the first-line drugs used to treat this disease. This study supplies some important findings that will enable a clearer understanding of the mechanisms of resistance to antimalarial drugs and the testing of novel therapeutic strategies in a context where the drug resistance of parasites is of increasing concern.

6 May 2010

News outlets continue malaria coverage

World Malaria Day was Sunday and news organizations continued to cover local events.

28 Apr 2010

News outlets examine World Malaria Day 2010

Ahead of Sunday's World Malaria Day, news outlets examined global efforts to combat the disease and the mood among advocates.

27 Apr 2010

New research project to make anti-malarial drugs more affordable in Third World countries

Dr Geoff Brown, from the University of Reading's Department of Chemistry, is beginning a £400,000 project that could prove vital for the developing world in its ongoing fight against malaria. His research aims to make anti-malarial drugs more affordable in Third World countries where more than 1.5 million people die of the disease every year.

24 Apr 2010

PMI releases 6-year malaria strategy

The U.S. government Thursday released a six-year strategy to address malaria globally, Reuters reports (Fox, 4/22). The plan was issued through the President's Malaria Initiative (PMI) in conjunction with World Malaria Day, April 25, and is a "core component of President [Barack] Obama's Global Health Initiative," according to a USAID press release (4/22).

24 Apr 2010

People around the world support anti-malaria campaigns

Congressional Malaria Champions today received over 20,000 signatures from people around the world supporting efforts to eliminate malaria. Members of local youth soccer teams and actress Molly Sims presented signatures gathered through United Against Malaria, a soccer driven anti-malaria campaign, and by World Vision's End Malaria campaign.

21 Apr 2010

Report details progress in fighting malaria in Africa, notes funding shortfall

Global funding for malaria reached $1.7 billion in 2009, a "ten-fold" increase since 2004, and the production of insecticide-treated nets (ITNs) worldwide rose to 150 million last year, according to a report, released Monday, from UNICEF and the Roll Back Malaria (RBM) partnership, which also highlighted the need for additional funding, Agence France-Presse reports (4/19).

21 Apr 2010

Researchers investigate effects of nanoparticles on yeast

Nanoparticles are already widely used in everyday products such as cosmetics, textiles, dyes, and paints. It is quite possible that these minute fragments of matter may in future not only come to play a crucial role in medicine and pharmacology, but also in the food and biotechnology industries. The latest research currently being conducted in India has shown that nanoparticles can promote the growth of fungi and even assist plant growth.

12 Apr 2010

WHO issues new guidelines for malaria treatment

The World Health Organization (WHO) is releasing new guidelines for the treatment of malaria, and the first ever guidance on procuring safe and efficacious anti-malarial medicines.

11 Mar 2010

WHO's updated malaria guidelines include rapid diagnosis, new ACT

The WHO on Tuesday released new guidelines for the treatment of malaria, which recommend "parasitological testing before treatment begins" and add "a new artemisinin based combination treatment [ACT] to the list of prescribed drugs," BMJ News reports.

11 Mar 2010

Also in global health news: Infant, maternal mortality in N. Korea; malaria in Cambodia; Zambia PEPFAR program; Pakistan's anti-polio campaign; U.N. Ambassador responds to Somalia; Myanmar refugees

Higher rates of infant and maternal mortality have lead to a decline of life expectancy in North Korea over the past 15 years, census figures, which were obtained with help form the U.N. Population Fund, said on Monday, Agence France-Presse reports (2/22).

23 Feb 2010

Recent releases in Global Health

The Infectious Diseases Center for Global Health Policy's "Science Speaks" blog examines U.S. Global AIDS Coordinator Eric Goosby's recent address to the Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI) where he reemphasized the Obama administration's commitment to "'maintaining, extending and increasing' the U.S. response to global AIDS." Goosby reflected on the lessons drawn from PEPFAR to date and presented components of the 5-year PEPFAR strategy, the blog notes.

20 Feb 2010

Researchers discover chemical compound to combat malaria and bacterial diseases

Researchers report that they have discovered - and now know how to exploit - an unusual chemical reaction mechanism that allows malaria parasites and many disease-causing bacteria to survive. The research team, from the University of Illinois, also has developed the first potent inhibitor of this chemical reaction.

16 Feb 2010

Antimalarial medicines in African countries are substandard, says QAMSA study

The first results from a large-scale study of key antimalarial medicines in ten Sub-Saharan African countries reveal that a high percentage of medicines circulating on national markets are of substandard quality and thus may contribute to the growth of drug-resistant strains of Plasmodium falciparum, the most virulent form of malaria.

10 Feb 2010

Findings of poor quality malaria drugs in Africa add to artemisinin-resistance worries

A study released on Monday found that between 26 percent and 44 percent of artemisinin-based malaria drugs sold in Madagascar, Senegal and Uganda "failed quality testing" because of impurities or insufficient amounts of active ingredient, the Associated Press reports.

10 Feb 2010

Breakthrough research could lead to new potential treatments for malaria

Groundbreaking research done at Singapore's Nanyang Technological University's (NTU) School of Biological Sciences (SBS) could lead to the development of more potent drugs or a vaccine for malaria, which is transmitted to humans by infected mosquitoes and kills up to three million people each year.

6 Feb 2010

New effort to produce standardized DNA parts for reducing development time of synthetic biology in labs

With seed money from the National Science Foundation (NSF), bioengineers from the University of California, Berkeley, and Stanford University are ramping up efforts to characterize the thousands of control elements critical to the engineering of microbes so that eventually, researchers can mix and match these "DNA parts" in synthetic organisms to produce new drugs, fuels or chemicals.

21 Jan 2010

Genetic map of Artemisia will accelerate breeding to address increased demand for malaria treatments

Plant scientists at the University of York have published the first genetic map of the medicinal herb Artemisia annua. The map is being used to accelerate plant breeding of Artemisia and rapidly develop the species into a high-yielding crop. This development is urgently needed to help meet escalating demand for effective malaria treatments.

19 Jan 2010

First genetic map of malaria drug plant could increase crop yields, study says

The first genetic map of the plant Artemisia annua, which could "help scientists develop the species into a high-yielding crop" to fight malaria, was published in a study in the journal Science on Thursday, Reuters reports (Kelland, 1/14).

18 Jan 2010

Also in Global Health news: Hospital births in Guinea-Bissau; drought in E. Africa; drug-resistant malaria; U.S. response to H1N1

IRIN examines the increase in the number of women giving birth in hospital settings rather than delivery by a traditional birth attendant - a behavior that health officials hope will lead to a drop in the country's maternal mortality rate. "According to UNFPA, 38 percent of women gave birth in a hospital in 2009, up from 29 percent in 2003," the news service writes.

17 Dec 2009