Antimalarial medication
Antimalarial medications or simply antimalarials are a type of antiparasitic chemical agent, often naturally derived, that can be used to treat or to prevent malaria, in the latter case, most often aiming at two susceptible target groups, young children and pregnant women. While many treatments, including for severe malaria, continue to depend on therapies deriving historically from the injectable drugs quinine and artesunate, the development of drug resistance in the parasite has necessitated the development new antimalarial therapies. Though antimalarial drugs have repeatedly been observed to elicit resistance in the malaria parasite—including for combination therapies featuring artemisinin, where resistance has previously been observed in Southeast Asia, Artemisinin-based combination therapies (ACTs) have remained the foundational treatment for falciparum malaria globally as of 2024. Incidence and distribution of the disease ("malaria burden") is expected to remain high, globally, for many years to come. Despite positive outcomes from various modern treatments, serious side effects have been seen to affect some individuals taking standard doses (e.g., retinopathy with chloroquine, acute haemolytic anaemia with tafenoquine).
Antimalarial drugs may be used to treat malaria in three categories of individuals, (i) those with suspected or confirmed infection, (ii) those visiting a malaria-endemic regions who have no immunity, to prevent infection via malaria prophylaxis, and (iii) or in broader groups of individuals, in routine but intermittent preventative treatment in regions where malaria is endemic via intermittent preventive therapy. Practice in treating cases of malaria is most often based on the concept of combination therapy (e.g., using agents such as artemether and lumefantrine against chloroquine-resistant Plasmodium falciparum infection), since this offers advantages including reduced risk of treatment failure, reduced risk of developed resistance, as well as the possibility of reduced side-effects. Prompt parasitological confirmation by microscopy, or alternatively by rapid diagnostic tests, is recommended in all patients suspected of malaria before treatment is started. Treatment solely on the basis of clinical suspicion is considered when a parasitological diagnosis is not possible.
Anti-malaria aid campaigns have a globally positive effect for health outcomes and beyond.