From Tropical Rainforest to Pharmaceutical Laboratories: Nature versus Computational Medicine

Abstract

Infectious diseases are the leading cause of death worldwide particularly in low-income countries (“Introduction to Infectious Diseases”). These types of diseases, such as Ebola, human immunodeficiency virus and human papillomavirus, are around for decades, even centuries. Some, such as variola strain of smallpox and polio, have been eradicated or become well con-trolled, while others mutated into newer and deadlier versions like coronavirus. Malaria is a tropi-cal disease carried by mosquitoes that can be traced back to colonial times as early as 1500s-1700s CE in places like Mesoamerica, specifically Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salva-dor, but it is thought to been around since 3200CE in other parts of the world.In 2018, the Cen-ter for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported that this mosquito-borne disease killed approximately 405,000 people (CDC - Malaria). In efforts to eliminate this deadly ailment worldwide, much research in medicinal treatments has taken place, resulting in the decline of ma-larial human mortality by 25% from 2010 to 2016 (CDC – Malaria - About Malaria). Similar to malaria, leishmaniasis (leish) is also a tropical disease, though, in this case transmitted by sand-flies. It was first confirmed in 1903 by Scottish doctor William Leishman in Britain Medical Journal, yet medical archeologists found records describing leish as early as 1885 BCE (“leish-maniasis.” World Health Organization). This tropical disease kills anywhere between 700,000 to 1.2 million people who contract it each year (CDC - leishmaniasis). In contrast to malaria, little is known about leishmaniasis, and it is still currently being researched as newer and deadlier strands appeared worldwide. Medicine is trying to keep up with the mutations of infectious diseases, yet Western medicine has overlooked what ancient Mayan Curanderos utilized with little to no me-dicinal knowledge. By demonstrating the importance of nature’s secrets in treating malaria and leishmaniasis, this study seeks to implore big pharma to investigate more avenues in natural com-pounds for drug design.