Some endangered species have potential use in medical treatment, the first international conference on the importance of biodiversity to human health was told in Galway yesterday.
Species with this potential are startlingly diverse and include snails that may contain more medicines to treat human disease than any other group of organisms in the world and hibernating bears that could hold the secrets to preventing and treating osteoporosis.
Eric Chivian, director of the Centre for Health and the Global Environment at Harvard Medical School pointed out that although the evidence of global environment change surrounded us, most people did not grasp the magnitude of the threats they and their children faced.Nobel laureate Mr Chivian used the example of the cone snails that live in tropical coral reefs the world over, which are being destroyed, mainly due to global warming.
"There are about 500 species of cone snail and each contains up to 10 different poisons.
"Cone snails make more poison than any other organism on the planet. We have only studied three snails in any depth and already we have started to find medications that have totally revolutionised medicine." One of these medications, Mr Chivian explained is a drug for the treatment of chronic pain called Prialt for which Irish-based company, Elan Pharmaceuticals has recently received FDA approval in the US.
The new drug is reputed to be 1,000 times more potent than morphine and vitally, does not cause tolerance or dependency as opiate drugs do.
