Cheap over-the-counter nail drug found to work on crippling flesh-eating disease

A woman being treated for mycetoma in Khartoum before the war. The drug currently used to treat the disease costs $2,000 a year for one patient. Photograph: Lameck Ododo/DNDi

A cheap and easily taken drug used to treat fungal nail infections has been found to work against a devastating flesh and bone-eating disease found across Africa, Asia and the Americas.

Researchers say the breakthrough offers hope to thousands of patients who have suffered decades of neglect and can face amputations if the disease is left untreated.