THE first human trials of a herbicide that can kill the malaria parasite have been successful. The drug cleared the parasite from 23 sufferers in Gabon in an average of 48 hours, and caused only mild side effects.
The success represents a triumph for researchers analysing the parasite’s genome, which was published in full in October. A team at Justus-Liebig University in Giessen, Germany, used the gene sequence to deduce that a herbicidal and antibacterial drug called fosmidomycin would inhibit a key enzyme in the parasite, and this was confirmed in lab tests in 1999.
The latest trial, led by…
