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Frog killer fungus ‘breakthrough’
"We found that we could cure them completely of chytrids, And even when they were really sick in the control group, we managed to bring them back almost from the dead."
- Phil Bishop from the University of Otago.
New Zealand scientists have found what appears to be a cure for the disease that is responsible for wiping out many of the world's frog populations.
Chloramphenicol, currently used as an eye ointment for humans, may be a lifesaver for the amphibians, they say.
The researchers found frogs bathed in the solution became resistant to the killer disease, chytridiomycosis.
The fungal disease has been blamed for the extinction of one-third of the 120 species lost since 1980.