Open AccessPotential of cannabidiol for the treatment of viral hepatitis
Author(s) -
Henry Lowe,
Ngeh J. Toyang,
Wayne McLaughlin
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
pharmacognosy research
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 0976-4836
pISSN - 0974-8490
DOI - 10.4103/0974-8490.199780
Subject(s) - cannabidiol , hepatitis c , medicine , cannabis , virology , traditional medicine , pharmacology , psychiatry
Viral hepatitis B (HBV) and hepatitis C (HCV) pose a major health problem globally and if untreated, both viruses lead to severe liver damage resulting in liver cirrhosis and cancer. While HBV has a vaccine, HCV has none at the moment. The risk of drug resistance, combined with the high cost of current therapies, makes it a necessity for cost-effective therapeutics to be discovered and developed. The recent surge in interest in Medical Cannabis has led to interest in evaluating and validating the therapeutic potentials of Cannabis and its metabolites against various diseases including viruses. Preliminary screening of cannabidiol (CBD) revealed that CBD is active against HCV but not against HBV in vitro . CBD inhibited HCV replication by 86.4% at a single concentration of 10 μM with EC 50 of 3.163 μM in a dose-response assay. These findings suggest that CBD could be further developed and used therapeutically against HCV.