What was curious for me was that the parasite host had to take an experimental drug. Was it experimental because it was new, or was it because the FDA watches over drugs a lot more cautiously than its counterpart in other countries?
Apparently, it was your second suggestion. This is from the book
Leishmania by Jay Farrell, that I found online.
"Organic pentavalent antimony in the form of sodium antimony gluconate has been used since the 1940s. Two such preparations, sodium stibogluconate and meglumine antimoniate have been used over three decades as first line VL chemotherapy. Current penavalent antimony preparations include sodium stibogulconate, available as
Pentostam (Wellcome Foundation Ltd., London) and meglumine antimoniate, available as Glucantime (...France, Brazil) that is used mostly in South America." (It goes on to say there are a couple of mfgrs. in India and at least one in China.)
So, it does exist in SA and is available there. Well, I'm sure he knows more about now than he ever dreamed.
Sue