Chemical Hybridization Approaches Applied to Natural and Synthetic Compounds for the Discovery of Drugs Active Against Neglected Tropical Diseases
Venkatesan Jayaprakash, Daniele Castagnolo, Yusuf Özkay in Medicinal Chemistry of Neglected and Tropical Diseases, 2019
Chagas disease is a zoonotic disease caused by the protozoan parasite Trypanosoma cruzi that can be transmitted to humans by blood-sucking triatomine bugs (also known as the “kissing” bug) belonging to the genera Triatoma, Rhodnius, and Panstrongylus (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 2018a). The parasite life cycle is divided in human (host) stages and triatomine bug stages. Chagas disease is currently treated with nifurtimox 1 and benznidazole 2 (Figure 1). Structure of active ingredients (nifurtimox and benznidazole) of drugs for Chagas disease.
Bugs (The True Bugs)
Gail Miriam Moraru, Jerome Goddard in The Goddard Guide to Arthropods of Medical Importance, Seventh Edition, 2019
Kissing bugs are nocturnal insects that are able to fly to their hosts with speed and agility. Both sexes bite, and they take their blood meals primarily at night, hiding in any available crack or crevice between feedings (about 36 hours). Triatoma, as a group, normally feed on a wide variety of small mammals but will readily feed on humans (Figure 13.16). Infection rates with Trypanosoma cruzi, the causative agent of Chagas’ disease, may be as high as 80–100% in some adult triatomine bug populations.70,71 Human kissing bug bites are especially common in poor, underdeveloped areas with dilapidated or poorly constructed huts or shacks. Infection is not by the salivary secretions associated with the bite but by fecal contamination of the bite site; however, other routes of transmission may be overlooked. In some communities in Mexico, for example, people believe that bug feces can cure warts or that the bugs have aphrodisiac powers.71,72 In addition, Mexican children often play with triatomine bugs collected in their houses, and in Jalisco, reduviid bugs are eaten with hot sauce by the Huichol Indians.71
Water-related insect vectors of disease *
Jamie Bartram, Rachel Baum, Peter A. Coclanis, David M. Gute, David Kay, Stéphanie McFadyen, Katherine Pond, William Robertson, Michael J. Rouse in Routledge Handbook of Water and Health, 2015
A vector-borne disease results from the transmission of illness-causing agents (bacteria, viruses, protozoa, and worms) by arthropod carriers of the disease (“vectors”), such as mosquitoes, ticks, and flies. Snails that play a role in schistosomiasis transmission are sometimes also considered vectors. Common vector-borne diseases and their vectors include malaria (Anopheles mosquitoes), river blindness (Simulium black flies), Rift Valley fever (Aedes and Culex mosquitoes), dengue (Aedes mosquitoes), yellow fever (Aedes mosquitoes), arboviral encephalitides (various species of mosquitoes), Chagas disease (Triatoma kissing bugs), Lyme disease (Ixodes ticks), plague (various fleas, predominantly Xenopsylla), and sleeping sickness (Glossina tsetse flies).
Signal peptide peptidase: a potential therapeutic target for parasitic and viral infections
Published in Expert Opinion on Therapeutic Targets, 2022
Christopher Schwake, Michael Hyon, Athar H. Chishti
Trypanosoma cruzi is the etiologic agent of Chagas’ disease and Trypanosoma brucei rhodesiense and gambiense are the etiologic agents of African sleeping sickness (Human African Trypanosomiasis, HAT). Both diseases present high mortality throughout their geographic regions. Chagas’ disease is transmitted by a triatomine vector, known by those in endemic regions as the kissing bug. Worldwide, Chagas’ affects 6 million people mainly in Latin-American countries as well as 300,000 people living in the US [44]. Triatomine bugs have established populations in the Southern United States, some of which are infected with T. cruzi [45]. The extent to which endemic transmission occurs in the US is unknown due to the low incidence of testing and diagnostic assays, but there has been reports of locally acquired Chagas’ disease in the past [46,47]. Disease can progress to a chronic infection resulting in serious heart inflammation and intestinal problems in those afflicted [48]. Chagas’ disease has very few treatment options with only two currently available drugs, benznidazole and nifurtimox. However, both compounds exhibit low efficacy toward the chronic form of the disease and deleterious side effects over a long treatment period can lead to noncompliance [48].
The management of Babesia, amoeba and other zoonotic diseases provoked by protozoa
Published in Expert Opinion on Therapeutic Patents, 2023
Clemente Capasso, Claudiu T. Supuran
The parasite Trypanosoma cruzi causes Chagas’ disease (CD), also known as American trypanosomiasis, which is spread via the bites of hematophagous triatomine insects, such as the vectors belonging to the genera Triatoma, Rhodnius, and Panstrongylus [5,82–84]. Although the disease is widespread in Latin America, it has spread to other parts of the world through a variety of channels, including migration, transfusions, organ transplants, congenital infection, and food-borne transmission, making it a problem even in non-endemic areas like North America, Europe, Japan, and Australia [5,85,86]. No vaccine or medication protects against CD [84]. Thus, vector control, blood and organ screening, and food safety are crucial in CD prevention [87,88]. Blood donor surveillance and CD screening questions have likely reduced acute transfusion-associated cases, as well as prenatal diagnosis and treatment prevent congenital transmission in women [84,87]. Challenges remain in more endemic locations and with widespread wild infection, such as Gran Chaco and the Amazon Basin, despite progress made in managing domestic vector infestation since 1991 [89]. Although the prevention campaign, CD remains a global public health issue due to the illness’s asymptomatic nature, widespread immigration, and many vectors and reservoirs [84]. Moreover, the disease manifests in chronic Chagas cardiomyopathy (CCC), which can develop years or decades after the initial infection [90].
Thio- and selenosemicarbazones as antiprotozoal agents against Trypanosoma cruzi and Trichomonas vaginalis
Published in Journal of Enzyme Inhibition and Medicinal Chemistry, 2022
Alexandra Ibáñez-Escribano, Cristina Fonseca-Berzal, Mónica Martínez-Montiel, Manuel Álvarez-Márquez, María Gómez-Núñez, Manuel Lacueva-Arnedo, Teresa Espinosa-Buitrago, Tania Martín-Pérez, José Antonio Escario, Penélope Merino-Montiel, Sara Montiel-Smith, Alicia Gómez-Barrio, Óscar López, José G. Fernández-Bolaños
Herein, we have focussed our attention on Chagas disease and trichomoniasis. On the one hand, Chagas disease (aka American trypanosomiasis), discovered by the Brazilian physician Carlos R.J. das Chagas in 1909, is endemic in Latin America, where it affects roughly 7 million people12; nevertheless, it is also being spread to USA, Canada, Europe and Australia, because of human migrations13, and therefore, becoming a global health problem14. Chagas disease is caused by the haemoflagellate protozoan Trypanosoma cruzi, whose transmission to humans naturally takes place by contact with faeces or urine of infected triatomine insects. The infection can also be transmitted by non-vectorial routes, such as the iatrogenic and the congenital one12. The life-cycle of the parasite involves three stages: epimastigotes (extracellular and replicative form found in the intestine of the vector), amastigotes (intracellular and proliferative form of the vertebrate host) and trypomastigotes (extracellular and non-replicative state found in the bloodstream)15,16. Currently, there are only two available drugs for the specific treatment of Chagas disease: benznidazole (BZ), a nitroimidazole, and nifurtimox, a nitrofurane both showing some disadvantages (e.g., low efficacy in the chronic phase, adverse effects and parasite drug resistance) that constitute one of the main drawbacks of this parasitosis17.
Related Knowledge Centers
- Lymph Node
- Megaesophagus
- Parasitic Disease
- Trypanosoma Cruzi
- Cardiovascular Disease
- Tropical Disease
- Triatominae
- Arthropod Bites & Stings
- Chronic Condition
- Heart Failure