A group of scientists said they have confirmed that certain compounds derived from amodiaquine, a drug widely used to treat malaria, can block the Ebola virus, sources said.
A paper on the discovery by the group, which includes Prof. Masanori Baba of Kagoshima University Center for Chronic Viral Diseases, has been carried in the online edition of international academic journal Antiviral Research.
The group aims to develop a new drug based on the compounds.
Baba has been using amodiaquine for his research on the development of drugs for treating severe fever with thrombocytopenia syndrome (SFTS), an ixodid tick-borne infectious disease. Since the publication of another paper claiming that amodiaquine has the potency to lower the mortality rate of Ebola patients, Baba has been studying the drug's anti-Ebola virus mechanism.
Baba and his coresearchers made about 100 compounds by modifying the chemical structure of amodiaquine. When amodiaquine derivatives were inserted into cells cultivated in vitro, they identified compounds that strongly inhibited viral growth.
The group is planning to conduct further experiments on mice.
"If we can confirm the efficacy in animals, then it will lead to the development of a new drug against Ebola," Baba said.
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