But in 2005, a large study in four Asian countries, led by Dondorp and Nicholas White, both employed by the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom but based at Mahidol University in Bangkok, showed that injections of artesunate reduced deaths from severe malaria by 35 % over quinine. (sciencemag.org)
Surprisingly, the mutant parasites can not be killed by the anti-malarial drug chloroquine, which interferes with hemozoin formation, but yet, remain sensitive to the drug artesunate which targets another pathway of hemoglobin digestion. (sciencedaily.com)
Since then, several Asian countries have started replacing quinine with artesunate for severe malaria. (sciencemag.org)