Drug discovery for chagas disease: A viewpoint

•Chagas disease is a significant public health problem in Latin America.•There is a clear need for safe, effective and accessible new treatments.•Lack of understanding of Chagas disease hinders drug discovery efforts.•New knowledge and tools may allow improved translation to the clinic.•The Chagas c...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Acta tropica 2019-10, Vol.198, p.105107-105107, Article 105107
Main Author: Kratz, Jadel Müller
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Chagas disease
Chagas Disease - drug therapy
Chagas Disease - parasitology
Drug Discovery
Humans
Nifurtimox - therapeutic use
Nitroimidazoles - therapeutic use
Trypanocidal Agents - therapeutic use
Trypanosoma cruzi
Trypanosoma cruzi - drug effects
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Summary:•Chagas disease is a significant public health problem in Latin America.•There is a clear need for safe, effective and accessible new treatments.•Lack of understanding of Chagas disease hinders drug discovery efforts.•New knowledge and tools may allow improved translation to the clinic.•The Chagas community must commit to collaboration to ensure patients will benefit. Chagas disease is a neglected tropical disease caused by the protozoan parasite Trypanosoma cruzi. It is a significant public health problem, affecting millions of people worldwide. And although it was described 110 years ago, only two old nitroheterocyclic drugs, benznidazole and nifurtimox, are currently available for the treatment of Chagas disease and both have several limitations. Besides the clear unmet medical need, many challenges preclude the development of new treatments, some of them related to a lack of understanding of the pathophysiology of the disease and parasite-host interactions. New knowledge and tools are becoming available, but the number of new chemical entities progressing through the preclinical pipeline is inadequate. Therefore, it is still uncertain whether safe, effective and accessible new drugs will be available in the near future. The Chagas disease research community must commit to even greater collaboration to ensure that patients eventually benefit from better treatments.
ISSN:0001-706X
1873-6254
DOI:10.1016/j.actatropica.2019.105107