Malaria is a deadly disease transmitted by
mosquitoes. It kills at least 650,000 people every year but Amyris engineered a
yeast strain that produces malaria drug artemisinin on an industrial scale. The
yeast strain was already engineered but the yield improved from 1.6 grams per
liter to 25 grams per liter. Also, before the yeast strain was engineered
artemisinin was only created from plants which cost $350 to $1200 per kilogram.
The discovery of three enzymes in sweet wormwood was the main improvement for large
scale production. Artemisinin is the main ingredient in World’s Health Organization’s
malaria treatment. It takes about three
months to produce artemisinin compared to fifteen months for plant-based
methods. Sanofi is a French pharmaceutical company that has already started to
generate nearly 40 tons of artemisinic acid. Their goal is to manufacture 60
tons of artemisinic acid for next year and that amount meets a third of the
world’s supply. They promise to sell the drug without profit. Jack Newman,
chief scientific officer at Amyris says “There should never been a shortage of
artemisinin ever again.” There are concerns that it’s too early to launch the
synthetic drug because it can hurt the plant-based production. So Sanofi will
introduce the synthetic product at “the lower end of the market range” that will
even out price fluctuations rather than competing against other producers.
The mass production of artemisinin will never lead
to a shortage. Since the cost of making the synthetic product is reduced poor
countries can now afford the cheap drug. In the next five years, malaria will
definitely be under control and reduced greatly. No doubt more synthetic products
will be created to contain the spread of other diseases.
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