By Enyichukwu Enemanna
European drug regulators on Friday gave nod to a new and simpler treatment for sleeping sickness, in what is believed to be a giant boost to efforts to eliminate the disease.
A European Medicines Agency committee endorsed the acoziborole, produced by Sanofi. The decision is seen as a crucial step to making the medicine available in Congo, the African country with the most sleeping sickness cases, then paving way for deployment across the continent.
Proponents of the medical product say three of the pills, taken together as a one-time dose, are an easier and far more accessible treatment than current regimens, which can require several visits to hospitals.
“This disease is on the brink of elimination” and the new drug could accelerate progress toward finishing the job, Dr. Junior Matangila of the Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative said, an international organisation focused on new treatments.
If sleeping sickness could be eliminated, it might be the first time spread of an infectious disease was erased without a vaccine, the producing firm, Sanofi’s officials noted.
Monica Mugnier, a sleeping sickness researcher at Johns Hopkins University, said the drug is a major treatment improvement but that it’s yet not clear exactly how big a turning point its approval will be. She argued that there are still questions about where the disease-causing parasite is lurking, for example. “This isn’t solved yet,” she said.
Sleeping sickness is spread by tsetse flies found only in rural, sub-Saharan Africa. The flies bite people and infect them with a parasite, research indicates.
Infections for sleeping sickness can start with vague, flu-like symptoms, and then worsen as the parasites multiply and fan out through the body, including into the nervous system.
One result is the namesake symptom: a flipped sleep cycle in which people are awake at night but drowsy during the day. Coma and death can occur if it’s not treated.
Researchers have been unable to develop a vaccine against the wormlike microscopic parasite because it has a unique ability to alter its protein coat, making it difficult to design an enduring immune system defense, Mugnier said.
The battle against the parasite has relied on efforts to kill off the flies and on medicines to save infected people. It’s been difficult. Many of the infected are living in remote areas without access to hospitals.
“It’s a disease of poverty,” said Matangila, who is based in Congo.
Sleeping sickness surged in the 1970s and 1990s amid political and economic instability in sub-Saharan Africa. It was worsened by the traditionally available medications which were toxic and painful.
