Protein Kinase Inhibitors as Potential Antimicrobial Drugs Against Tuberculosis, Malaria and HIV

Infectious diseases that are caused by pathogenic microbes such as bacteria, viruses, parasites or fungi remain the top major cause of death across the world, particularly in low income countries, and may be transmitted from person to person, or from insects or animals. In general, infectious diseases may be treated with antimicrobial agents including antibiotics, antiviral, antifungal or antiparasitic medications. The therapeutic application of antimicrobial drugs in the 20th century substantially contributed to the global control of infectious diseases worldwide. However, pathogenic microbes have evolved various mechanisms to render the antimicrobial drugs less effective. This has resulted in an increasing number of people infected with pathogenic microbes that are resistant to antimicrobial drugs, and in some cases leading to untreatable infections. Therefore, new antimicrobial drugs are urgently needed to prevent possible recurrence and emergence of previously treatable infectious diseases. In the past decades, protein kinase inhibitors have become an attractive area in the development of novel antimicrobial drugs. In the current review, we will describe the recent efforts in the development of microbial and host protein kinase-targeting inhibitors as potential antimicrobial drugs against HIV, tuberculosis and malaria.