A study of the antimalarial constituents of cassia abbreviata oliv and strychnos Henningsii Gilg.

Abstract

Malaria remains a major health threat to millions of people in the developing countries. Efforts to prevent the disease through vector control have not been successful due to socio-economic reasons. The malaria parasite is resistant to most medicines in current clinical use. Resistance to chloroquine, the sulfonamide/pyrimethamine combinations and mefloquine prompted the World Health Organization to adopt the use of Artemisinin Combination Therapy (ACT). Majority of the residents in malaria endemic areas cannot afford effective medicines due to poverty. In these regions, traditional herbal medicines contribute significantly towards the treatment of malaria. There is a need to identify the active chemical components of these traditional remedies in order to rationalize the traditional uses and improve on their efficacy. Furthermore, there is urgent need to search for novel drugs from nature to act as alternative antimalarials in the face of rising resistance to existing ones. Literature review Cassia abbreviata and Strychnos henningsii are used by the Taita community in Kenya for the treatment of malaria. Decoctions of the roots of these plants are effective therapeutic agents either singly or in combination. Published work also records the use of the two plants as antimalarials. The methanol extract of C. abbreviata root has been shown to have good activity against the VI/S strain of Plasmodium falciparum. A literature survey revealed that several alkaloids have previously been isolated and