From the University of Cape Town comes some bad news for global warming alarmists, Malaria deaths may soon be a thing of the past and their attempts to link such deaths to global warming will evaporate if this cure holds up in clinical trials. Of course it never did anyway: Another alarming climate myth bites the dust – mosquito borne malaria does NOT increase with temperature
So if this is a real cure, no more cushy grants for Michael Mann to study Malaria and AGW then, see Mann’s 1.8 million Malaria grant – ‘where do we ask for a refund’? The most amazing part is the research is only 18 months old….so I expect it will be given an even more rigorous clinical review. (h/t to WUWT reader Jason) – Anthony
African research identifies strong candidate for possible single-dose malaria cure
28 August 2012
A compound discovered by a UCT drug discovery programme has been selected by MMV for its potent activity against multiple points in parasite’s lifecycle
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| Big news: Prof Kelly Chibale (centre), here with Minister Naledi Pandor, speaks about the compound MMV390048 that he and international collaborators hope will lead to the development of a single-dose treatment for malaria. | Panel report: Dr Tim Wells, Prof Kelly Chibale, Minister Naledi Pandor, Dr Max Price and Dr Richard Gordon of the Technology Innovation Agency address the media at a press conference where they announced the development of the new compound. |
A recently discovered compound – named MMV390048 – from the aminopyridine class not only has the potential to become part of a single-dose cure for all strains of malaria, but might also be able to block transmission of the parasite from person to person, according to a research collaboration involving the Medicines for Malaria Venture (MMV), based in Switzerland, and the Drug Discovery and Development Centre (H3-D) at UCT.
This was announced at UCT today.
On the basis of initial results it was selected by MMV for further development – making it the first compound researched on African soil to enter preclinical development in partnership with MMV.
An African solution to save lives
Naledi Pandor, the Minister of Science & Technology, said: “This is a significant victory in the battle to alleviate the burden of disease in the subcontinent. Clearly the war on this disease is not yet won, but I am excited by the role that our excellent scientists have played in this milestone in finding a potential cure for malaria and possibly preventing its transmission. Congratulations to Professor Kelly Chibale and all involved. This is evidence of the world-class science being done in South Africa and the continent, and of the power of continental and international scientific collaboration in the multidisciplinary approaches that are essential in addressing the societal challenges of our time.”
Dr Max Price, the vice-chancellor of UCT, said: “H3-D was founded at UCT in 2010 for this very purpose: to develop African expertise towards solving the health problems that beset the developing world. We trust this clinical candidate is the first of many contributions Professor Chibale and his team will be making to the advancement of international medicine.”
H3-D identified a molecule, code named MMV390048, which was selected in July 2012 by MMV’s Expert Scientific Advisory Committee for further development. The promising new compound shows potent activity against multiple points in the malaria parasite’s lifecycle. This means it not only has the potential to become part of a single-dose cure for malaria but might also be able to block transmission of the parasite from person to person.
The aminopyridine series was initially identified by Griffith University scientists in Australia as part of MMV’s extensive malaria screening campaign of around 6 million compounds. A team of scientists from H3-D, led by UCT Professor Kelly Chibale, further scrutinised and explored the antimalarial potential of the series. With parasitological, pharmacological and contract chemistry support from the Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute (Switzerland), the Centre for Drug Candidate Optimization at Monash University (Australia) and Syngene (India) respectively, the H3-D team selected the most promising compounds from the series to be optimised and retested.
In just 18 months the team had identified and developed a candidate suitable for preclinical development.
Equipping the next generation of African scientists
“We are very excited that this promising compound, researched by African scientists, has been selected by MMV for further development,” said Chibale, the founder and director of H3-D. “This is truly a proud day for African science and African scientists. Our team is hopeful that the compound will emerge from rigorous testing as an extremely effective medicine for malaria – a disease that accounts for 24% of total child deaths in sub-Saharan Africa. What is more, H3-D and MMV achieved MMV390048 as a clinical candidate in record time. In the process we have developed a unique model for successful technology platforms, and generic modern pharmaceutical industry expertise and skills, to discover drugs in potentially any disease area in Africa.”
Dr Tim Wells, MMV’s Chief Scientific Officer, said: “This is a great achievement and an excellent example of the quality of research that can be fostered in Africa. We look forward to seeing more exciting compounds emerge from Kelly’s team and are proud to be collaborating with H3-D; not only is it conducting excellent science today, but it is also providing world-class training for the next generation of African scientists.”
What is so unique and exciting about MMV390048
- It is very potent: it displayed a complete cure of animals infected with malaria parasites in a single dose given orally, and thus has the potential to cure millions of people.
- It is active against a wide panel of resistant strains of the malaria parasite.
- Developing the drug has made possible the training of more than 10 local scientists and cemented a strong relationship with an international partner.
- The clinical candidate is in line to enter clinical trials in late 2013.
View a video of Prof Kelly Chibale speaking about H3-D.
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Mr. Watts, the question these days is what is going on in the Arctic, Please answer. Epidemics might be of interest, but you are supposed to be interested in climate.
Hooray! Real science undoing the damage brought by Rachel Carson and her unfounded war on DDT. Silent Spring has cost enough lives.
It is ignorant to associate a hypothetical warming with increases in vector populations and/or infectiousness. The Lyme tick Ixodes lifecycle is so exquisitely tuned, across years, generations and stages, that warming and or cooling have little effect compared with daylight hours mediated diapause and growth rate function of temperature. In the paleartic, Ixodes are prevalent 10° farther north than in the neartic.
Francois: you are a bit late to the party. Anthony has already addressed the issue of Arctic ice.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/08/27/sea-ice-news-volume-3-number-11-part-2-other-sources-show-no-record-low/
Please pay attention.
Doug Huffman, it is not so much the lifecycle of the insect vector, but the ability of the pathogen to traverse its own temperature dependent lifecycle in that vector. For example, there are mosquitoes in the arctic, and avian malaria parasites are moving northward in bird populations that have no innate immune status against malaria. Think small pox and the American indians. The environmental temperature bottleneck for the malaria parasite is the time it takes to traverse its lifecycle in the mosquito, and increasing environmental temperature reduces this time such that the parasite can expand its range.
And Robin, mosquitoes were becoming resistant to DDT by the 1960s.
Good point – this would be like funding a number of groups to try different approaches to dealing with cancer. What a waste of money when one of them might find a cure!
Wow. That is some really great news. Especially for some folks that live in certain areas of the globe. Way cool!
Good news!
something to eliminate parasites… Hmmm… Does it come in anti-wind creep strain? I need a few gallons
francois says:
August 30, 2012 at 9:58 am
Mr. Watts, the question these days is what is going on in the Arctic, Please answer. Epidemics might be of interest, but you are supposed to be interested in climate.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Since when francois do you get to decide what Mr. Watts is supposed to be interested in?
For the record, there were two threads on arctic ice on the 27th and another thread on the 29th regarding the manner in which heat gets stored in water below the ice and how this affects ice over all. That’s not enough for you?
“It is active against a wide panel of resistant strains of the malaria parasite.”
So it’s not working against all of them? That may mean it’s only matter of time until the resistant ones prevail…
francois says:
August 30, 2012 at 9:58 am
Mr. Watts, the question these days is what is going on in the Arctic, Please answer. Epidemics might be of interest, but you are supposed to be interested in climate.
_______________________________
Read the headline banner.
It is Anthony’s site so he gets to say what he wants to publish not you and he often publishes various items of interest.
Thank you Anthony for bringing this very important breakthrough to our attention. I an old enough to remember the polio vaccine breakthrough. I had classmates with polio some of whom died so this really strikes a resonating cord.
We have had a cure for Malaria since 1995 which has been used by Malawi and by hundreds of thousands of people around the world … me included! The fact that mainstream medicine chooses to ignore it is a question for them to answer ,but would suggest since it is a very common substance there is no money to be made! Google Jim Humble!
I most sincerely hope that this is as claimed. My father contracted malaria in Burma (look it up) during WWII and had recurring attacks during his life.
This sounds very promising, but also sounds like it is still early in the research & development cycle. Here’s to continued success with their work!
“From the University of Cape Town comes some bad news for global warming alarmists, Malaria deaths may soon be a thing of the past …”
Anthony, name someone that wishes malaria deaths.
Give us a name.
REPLY: Ah, I see. Your ploy is to put words in my mouth not said nor implied. My point is that Malaria death statistics are used to hype of ‘malaria spread/increase is caused by AGW’ and there are plenty of bogus examples of that, see the link in the first paragraph. Another alarming climate myth bites the dust – mosquito borne malaria does NOT increase with temperature
– Anthony
Tom T: In the 1930’s between one in five and one in ten Siberians north of the 50th parallel between the Ob and the Yenissey Rivers had malaria, p.244, Biodiversity of Malaria in the World,
Jean Mouchet, Pierre Carnevale, Sylvie Manguin.
It was pretty cold there long before evil humans had warmed the globe.
Steve East 10:34am:
I accepted your invitation to google Jim Humble. It seems he markets, as a cure for practically everything, a mixture of Sodium Chlorite and citrus juice which is banned in Canada, and which has been described by USA and Australian authorities as industrial bleach. There are others on this site far more chemically knowledgeable than I am who could tell you why this is more likely to be a scam than anything else.
“… transmission of the parasite from person to person.”?????
The parasite is transmitted from person to mosquito, and then from mosquito to person. Except for blood transfusions from infected persons to the uninfected, it seems unlikely that any effort is necessary to block person to person transmission.
“From the University of Cape Town comes some bad news for global warming alarmists, Malaria deaths may soon be a thing of the past and their attempts to link such deaths to global warming will evaporate if this cure holds up in clinical trials. ”
OK, then name an “alarmist” that will view it as bad news that they can now longer link malarial deaths to global warming.
Name just one.
I suspect they all would view the eradication of malaria as a GOOD THING.
““… transmission of the parasite from person to person.”
It was short-hand, an oversight omission of the word “mosquito”. What they are referring to is the ability of the drug to kill the stages of the parasite in human blood that transmit to mosquitoes.
TomT,
The same alarmist crowd that mistakenly believes that the current Arctic sea ice cycle is bad, and therefore cheers the decline in ice are the same reprobates that love malaria deaths. They believe it validates their belief system, and they could not care less about humanity.
An empirical quantitative framework for the seasonal population dynamics of the tick Ixodes ricinus by S.E Randolph, R. M. Green, A. N. Hoodless, M. F. Peacey in International Journal for Parasitology 32 (2002) 979-989. References include in particular ‘Diapause and biological rhythms in ticks’ by Belozerov, V. N. in Physiology of Ticks, Obenchain, F.D. and Galun, R. eds (Pergamon)
Kasuha says:
August 30, 2012 at 10:26 am
“It is active against a wide panel of resistant strains of the malaria parasite.”
So it’s not working against all of them? That may mean it’s only matter of time until the resistant ones prevail…
==========================================
Let’s not bother then, is that what you are saying?
Navy Bob, from that same page 244, “This pandemic was particularly severe in the more temperate regions, although the cold regions were not spared.”
And what if those cold regions become more temperate?