Publications by authors named "M Ratsimbason"

species are responsible for the most common fungal infections worldwide. We studied the antifungal activity of a large panel of essential oils (EOs) against various species. The EOs activity against spp.

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The mite Sarcoptes scabiei is responsible for scabies, a pruritic and contagious skin disease in humans. S. scabiei is also responsible for mange in a wide range of animal species.

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The evolution and contemporary challenges of health research (HR) in Madagascar are poorly documented. We aim to gain insights on the factors that shape Madagascar's National Health Research System (NHRS) to better understand their influence. We conducted a qualitative case study, which included a documentary review and semi-structured interviews with 38 key informants.

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On the island of Madagascar, prior to the arrival of the Europeans, some pathologies including malaria, locally known as tazo (fever), were already described. As part of the Malagasy traditional knowledge, traditional medicine mainly based on the use of herbal remedies is part of the malaria treatment still today. Across the country, hundreds of plants are identified as antimalarial, and some compounds from plants show interesting in vitro activities against human Plasmodium.

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Bioassay screening of plant extracts can identify unique lead compounds for drug development, but the "hit rate" from random screening is very low. Targeted screening of medicinal plants has been repeatedly reported to increase the percentage of samples displaying bioactivity. Contrarily, Maranz (2012) suggested that African antimalarial plants were unsuitable sources of antimalarial drugs because high prevalence of malaria would result in rapid evolution of resistance to active compounds that directly targeted the parasite.

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