Malaria, a potentially harmful parasitic disease, is caused by the anopheles mosquito, which infects the organism with a one-cell parasite that is called plasmodium. According to the WHO (World Health Organization), there are approximately 247 million human cases of malaria worldwide per annum. Of these, nearly 1 million people die every year, the casualties mostly being the infected children in Africa.

Malaria, the dreaded disease, is totally curable, but no vaccine has yet been found that can completely cure the disease. Scientists have long been in search of that one drug which could alleviate this infectious disease. It seems that their efforts have finally paid off, since the medical journal Science revealed that a new anti-malarial drug, the NITD609 also known as spiroindolone compound, has been discovered effective against plasmodium falciparum and plasmodium vivax, as well as other drug-resistant strains of malaria.

A research conducted by the Genomics Institute of the Novartis Research Foundation (GNF) in collaboration with the Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute and The Scripps Research Institute has given birth to this new compound called spiroindolone NITD609. The research was also funded by The Wellcome Trust, the Medicines for Malaria Venture (MMV), the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH), A*STAR, Singapore and the US Government. Leading scientists from these renowned institutions screened well over 12,000 chemical before they hit upon the experimental drug NITD609, of the drug group spiroindolone, as a potential cure for malaria.

It has been reported that five mice infected with malaria were given the spiroindolone NITD609 compound and were found to be completely cured without any side effects. It is being considered that this drug could be administered to human beings affected with malaria on a single-dose daily basis to combat the killer disease. Clinical trials, however, are still to be conducted to come to any concrete conclusion of the same.