Researchers Identify Compound in Malagasy Plant That Might Protect Against Malaria

Researchers have identified a compound in a plant found in Madagascar that might protect against malaria, a finding that could lead to a new treatment for the disease, according to a study published last week in PLoS Medicine, ANI/DailyIndia.com reports. Dominique Mazier of the Pierre and Marie Curie University in Paris and colleagues isolated the compound tazopsine from a plant used to treat malaria and found that it worked against liver stages of malaria in humans and mice. The researchers found that one of the compound's derivatives was particularly effective at protecting mice in the liver stage of malaria but did not protect against blood forms of the malaria parasite. This characteristic in a malaria drug makes drug resistance less likely to develop, according to the researchers (ANI/DailyIndia.com, 12/26/06).