Dr Charles Anane, a clinical pharmacist in cardiology and critical care, said Artemisinin-based drugs have come as a last resort to save the continent from malaria deaths and any attempt to make the parasite become used to the drug would have dire consequences for the region.
Artemisinin is a key ingredient in combination drug therapies recommended by the World Health Organization (WHO) for the treatment of multi-drug-resistant strains of falciparum malaria.
The combination has played a key role in combating malaria in Ghana though the disease remains the largest killer in the African country.
Artemisinin has become the first choice of medicine in fighting against malaria at almost all hospitals in Ghana and has significantly reduced the mortality rates of malaria, as it is reported to be saving more than 100,000 lives annually in Africa alone.
“If we destroy this combination or this drug, we are doomed as people living in areas that are endemic to malaria and we are part of them. And so we have to preserve that very well,” he told Xinhua.
“We don’t need to take one and then leave the rest because you are well. If you do that, you are not helping us because if the parasite becomes used to the combination, we are finished,” said Dr Anane, who is a medicine directorate head of the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital in Kumasi, 278 km north of the national capital.
Dr Anane said the ACTS are well tolerated and complied by patients, unlike some anti-malaria drugs like chloroquine used for a long time and for which patients developed resistance.
Chinese researcher Tu Youyou was named joint recipient of the 2015 Noble Prize in Physiology or Medicine for the discovery of Artemisinin which has revolutionized therapy for patients suffering from the devastating parasitic disease. Enditem
Source: Xinhua
