Malaria and River Blindness Drugs Share Nobel Prize

This year’s Nobel Prize for Medicine was awarded to three scientists whose research on parasitic diseases has saved the lives of millions and the sight of hundreds of millions of people in tropical countries. Following a lead from traditional Chinese medicine, Dr Youyou Tu discovered and isolated a chemical, artemisinin, from the sweet wormwood plant. Artemisinin is now the basis of successful malaria treatment worldwide. She shared the prize with Japanese microbiologist Satoshi Omura and Irish-born medicinal chemist William C Campbell for their discovery of a new chemical produced by a soil microbe. They discovered it killed roundworm parasites. It was modified into a drug, Ivermectin, which has been used to treat and prevent River Blindness (Onchocerciasis) and lymphatic filariasis in hundreds of millions of people in Sub-Saharan Africa.

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Picture: Ivermectin is administered. Credit: Getty Images