Current Treatments for Echinococcosis What We Have

Echinococcosis, caused by the larval stage of the cestode Echinococcus spp., is a chronic and lethal disease in humans. The current treatment strategy for Echinococcosis is radical resection of the parasitic mass, which is always accompanied by chemotherapy to avoid disease recurrence, especially in the case of alveolar echinococcosis (AE) caused by the metacestode of Echinococcus multilocularis. In the past 30 years, extensive research has been conducted on developing novel chemotherapy options against Echinococcosis. In this chapter, we outline a series of chemical compounds against E. granulosus and E. multilocularis. According to the different physicochemical properties of the compounds, previous studies examined the in vivo and in vitro effects on the mode of action, administration regimen, treatment outcome, and related clinical symptoms. These drugs include imidazole families and their derivatives, targeted chemosynthetic molecules (such as antivirals, antibiotics, antiparasitic, antifungal and antitumor drugs), natural compounds derived from plant and fungal extracts, small inhibitor molecules of key metabolic enzymes or signaling pathways, and combination therapy of drugs. It should be noted that the complexity of Echinococcosis and the heterogeneity of clinical cases make it necessary to deeply understand the host-parasite relationship and parasite phenotype at different developmental stages. This would be greatly helpful for achieving the best therapeutic efficacy of the novel drugs and providing better guidance for clinical treatment.