Table 1.
Comprehensive list of drugs and putative drug targets against Cryptosporidium effective here implies drugs reducing the oocyst shedding, enhancing parasitic clearance, and alleviating symptoms)
| Drugs/drug targets | Outcome of the parasite | Reference(s) |
|---|---|---|
| Nitazoxanide (NTZ) |
FDA-approved Limited efficacy in reducing parasite burden in non-AIDS patients Non-effective in AIDS patients |
Amadi et al. (2002, 2009), Rossignol et al. (2001, 2006) |
| Clofazimine (CFZ) |
Effective in an in vitro approach Found ineffective in phase-2 human trial |
Iroh Tam et al. (2020), Love et al. (2017) |
| Azithromycin (AZR) | AZR alone or AZR + NTZ having no significant effect | Lee et al. (2017) |
| Paromomycin | Effective against the parasite in a mouse model | Blagburn et al. (1998) |
| Halogeno-Thiazolides | Found effective in immunosuppressed Mongolian gerbils | Gargala et al. (2013) |
| Rifabutin, Rifaximin, Clarithromycin, Roxithromycin | Effective in vitro and in vivo (lack of extended research) | Amenta et al. (1999), Fichtenbaum et al. (2000), Holmberg et al. (1998), Uip et al. (1998) |
| Drugs against the calcium-dependent protein kinases (CDPKs) |
Effective in an in silico, in vitro, and in vivo setting Not entered human trials |
Huang et al. (2017; Hulverson et al. (2017a, b), Van Voorhis et al. (2021) |
| Phosphatidylinositol-4-OH kinase (PI(4)K) and lactate dehydrogenase inhibitors | Deemed effective in an in silico and in vitro setup | Dhal et al. (2018), Eltahan et al. (2018) Manjunatha et al. (2017), McNamara et al. (2013), Zhang et al. (2015) |
| K11777 (Inhibitors of clan-CA cysteine proteases) | In vitro and in vivo efficacy | Ndao et al. (2013), Siqueira-Neto et al. (2018) |
| Statin (HMG-CoA reductase inhibitors) | Atorvastatin found effective in immunocompromised infected mice | Bessoff et al. (2013), Kang et al. (2012), Madbouly Taha et al. (2017), Parihar et al. (2019) |
| Inhibitors against IMPDH enzyme | Effective in a mouse model and other in vitro approaches | Gorla et al. (2014), Jefferies et al. (2015), Shigetomi et al., (2019) |
| Alkylphosphocholines (Oleylphosphocholine-OIPC) | Effective in HCT-8 cell model and mice | Sonzogni-Desautels et al. (2015) |
| Triacsin-C (inhibitor of acyl-coenzyme-A synthetases) | Effective in immunocompromised mice | Guo et al. (2014) |
| MMV665917 (a piperazine-based compound repurposed from the Malaria Box) | In vitro efficacy | Jumani et al. (2018) |
| Benzoxaboroles (AN7973) and bicyclic azetidines | Observed in an in silico study, extended research warranted | Lunde et al. (2019), Swale et al. (2019), Vinayak et al. (2020) |