Study: The secret to treat ‘sleeping sickness’ found

Sleeping sickness mainly affects Africa and with inexpensive therapies out of a common man’s reach, a new study proves to be a boon. Researchers at the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University have identified a protein that is important to the good health of the parasite that causes sleeping sickness that could even lead to the death of the affected people. The researchers aim at developing new therapies that can destroy or disrupt this protein so that the parasite would not be able to reproduce and survive. Th drugs will be designed to either over express, deplete, or block the protein, said Zachary Mackey, one of the researchers. (Read: Century-old drug for sleep sickness may help ‘reverse’ autism symptoms in humans)

 The researchers also said that the protein will be exploited in many ways to kill the the parasite and a wide range of tiny molecules or drugs could be used to deregulate it. Sleeping sickness is caused  when Trypanosoma brucei parasite enters the bloodstream of the host and the parasite is transmitted by the African tsetse fly and as the parasite initially spreads through the body, it causes fever, headache, and intense aches and pains, according to the World Health Organisation.(Read: Coming soon – new drugs to cure sleeping sickness)

The parasite then slowly spreads to the brain where it causes swelling, and slurred speech, confusion, and difficulty in walking, followed by coma and eventually death. Although a few drugs are available to treat this infection, they are very expensive and have drastic side effects and hence this research can be called path breaking as it provides an inexpensive alternative to the current therapies.
The study appeared in the journal Cell Cycle.