PENANG, 22 Feb – Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) had been entrusted with the task of jointly carrying out research with several agencies including the University of Parma, Italy to produce drugs to treat malaria.
The collaboration between both parties is aimed at providing for the health needs of ‘the bottom billions’. Several organizations, including Tefarco Innova and Lisapharma S.p.A from Italy as well as Hovid Bhd, a pharmaceutical company in Ipoh, Perak are also involved in this collaboration.
USM’s involvement in this strategic partnership will witness the research team from the School of Pharmaceutical Sciences (PPSF) contributing their expertise in the formulation of drugs as well as carrying out clinical trials on the drugs.
Prof. Zaini Asmawi, the Deputy Dean of PPSF said that USM has vast experience in developing malarial drugs like arteminisin and USM’s expertise is required in the efforts to produce a combination therapy with arteminisin is guaranteed to be more effective compared to the use of arteminisin by itself.
The University Of Parma, he said has the technological expertise and by combining the expertise from both parties, it will give new hope to the 1.3 billion people around the world, and especially those in Asia who face the threat of this disease that kills approximately 1 million people each year.
“We hope that the partnership will eventually result in the best treatment regimen to help the people especially the children in developing countries like India, Myanmar, Indonesia, Bangladesh and Malaysia,” he said.
He said this at a press conference in USM yesterday, together with the delegation from the University of Parma. Also present was Prof. Paolo Colombo, Head of the Pharmaceutical Department of the Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Parma.
Prof. Paolo said that his people will be very committed to ensuring the success of the mission and hoped that it will become a reality within the next two years. He added that the research to develop arteminisin compounds will be conducted in USM while the input in terms of mateials and technology will be provided by the University of Parma.
”We truly hope that this product will be ready for use by the end of the research programme,” he said and described the collaboration as reducing the burden of the people in developing countries to obtain the best treatment for malaria.
Picture: Prof. Zaini Asmawi (third from left) shaking hands with Prof. Paolo Colombo while the delegation from Italy involved in the development of the malaria drug looks on.
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