Research and development of causal chemoprophylactics in malaria

Abstract

Malaria is an infectious disease of great epidemiological relevance worldwide, caused by several species of Plasmodium. Causal chemoprophylactics (QC) are important to prevent infection and/or development of liver forms of Plasmodium spp. Since the development of new QC is a topic of interest in malaria control, we carried out a literature review to determine the status of research and development of QC in in vivo models. The aim was to present a literature update and to draw attention to the importance of this field of research. We searched for literature published between 1995 and 2015 in the databases: PubMed, ScienceDirect, Google Scholar and the official website of the World Health Organization (WHO), using the keywords: chemoprophylaxis, quimioprofilaxis, malaria, Plasmodium and in vivo. We included 33 research articles of the world literature and four WHO reports, published between 1995 and 2015. Our review showed that the semisynthetic molecule NCP-tazopsine, and the synthetic molecules KAF156 (imidazolepiperazine) and tafenoquine (8 aminoquinoline) are the most promising causal chemoprophylactic agents currently under study. These molecules could become new alternatives for malaria control in the near future.

Keywords

• Chemoprophylaxis
• In vivo
• Malaria
• Plasmodium