A Herbal Remedy for Herpes Simplex Virus Infection

Tolo, Festus Mururi (2003) A Herbal Remedy for Herpes Simplex Virus Infection. Masters thesis, Kenyatta University.

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Abstract

Herpes Simplex Virus (HSV) infection has emerged as a major opportunistic infection particularly in immunosuppressed persons and therefore a serious disease ill high Human Immunodeficiency Virus!Aquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome (HIV/AIDS) prevalence areas as seen in sub-Saharan Africa. Present drugs for HSV management, such as the nucleoside analogue acyclovir, are experiencing resistance from the re-emerging strains of HSV. In this study, aqueous extracts from 12 medicinal plants were investigated for anti-HSV activity. The plants were collected within Kenya from medicinal plants used widely for the management of various diseases using information obtained from literature search and ethnomedical use. Plaque reduction assay was used to determine the in vitro anti-HSV activity for the extracts by evaluating the ability ofthe extracts to inhibit the formation of plaques in Vero E6 cells infected with 100 Plaque Forming Unit (PFU) of HSV. A 50% inhibition at 50~g/m1 extract concentration was registered as active. A murine model, in which BALB/c mice were cutaneously infected with HSV and treated with extract, was used for in vivo determinations of therapeutic efficacy for the extract showing the best antiviral activity in vitro. Acyclovir was used as a reference drug for both in vitro and in vivo investigations. In vitro and in vivo cytotoxicity of the extracts was determined by cell lysis and weight lose or death respectively. Of the 12 plants tested, three extracts from Carissa edulis (Forssk.) Vahl (Apocynaceae), May tenus heterophylla (Eckl. & Zeyh.) Robson (Celastraceae) and Periploca linearifolia Dill & A. Rich. (Asclepiadaceae) exhibited remarkable anti-HSV activity in vitro for both the wild type (HSV-1, HSV-2) and the resistant strains (TK- HSV-1, APTHSV-1) with an EC50 of 15-60Jlg/ml with no cell cytotoxicity (CC50 300-480 ug/ml). Carrisa edulis root-bark extract had the best activity in vitro, with a therapeutic index of between 31.8 and 69.6 for both susceptible and resistant HSV strains. The therapeutic efficacy of C. edulis extract was demonstrated in mice infected with wild type or resistant strains ofHSV since an oral dose of 250mg/kg significantly delayed the onset of HSV infections by over 50% and increased the mean survival time by 28% to 35% relative to the infected untreated mice (p < 0.05 Vs control by Student's t-test). The mortality rate for mice treated with extract was also reduced by between 70% and 90% as opposed to the infected untreated mice which had 100% mortality {p < 0.05 Vs control by repeated measure analysis of variance (ANOVA)}. No acute toxicity was observed in mice at the oral dose of 250mglkg. The anti-HSV activity seemed to arise from terpenoidal and phenolic compounds detected in these extracts. These results show that the water extracts from C. edulis, M heterophylla and P. linearifolia have anti-HSV activity. C. edulis root bark extract has both in vitro and in vivo activity and therefore can be exploited as an alternative herbal remedy for HSV infections.

Item Type:	Thesis (Masters)
Subjects:	R Medicine > R Medicine (General) R Medicine > RA Public aspects of medicine R Medicine > RZ Other systems of medicine
Divisions:	Africana
Depositing User:	Geoffrey Obatsa
Date Deposited:	09 May 2017 11:43
Last Modified:	09 May 2017 11:43
URI:	http://thesisbank.jhia.ac.ke/id/eprint/1488

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