Antimalarial drugs: what's new in the patents?

The efficacy of current therapeutic warheads in preventing malaria transmission or treating the disease is often hampered by the emergence of drug-resistance. No effective vaccines are available to date, and novel drugs able to counteract drug-resistant forms of malaria and/or to target multiple stages of the parasite's lifecycle are urgently needed.

This review covers patents that protect antimalarial small molecules bearing the artemisinin or other chemical scaffolds, as well as vaccines, that have been published in the period 2015-2022. Literature was searched in public databases of articles and patents. Patents protecting small molecules that prevent malaria transmission are not discussed herein.

Significant progress has been made in the design of antimalarial agents. Most of these candidates have been tested in standardized strains, with the use of Plasmodium clinical isolates for testing still underdeveloped. Several compounds have been profiled in in vivo mouse models of malaria, including humanized mice. Despite having different efficacy, these new molecules might further progress the field and hopefully will advance to clinical development soon.