ANTIVIRAL POTENTIAL OF MEDICINAL PLANTS: AN OVERVIEW

The term ‘Antiviral agents’ has been defined in very broad terms as substances other than a virus or virus containing vaccine or specific antibody which can produce either a protective or therapeutic effect to the clear detectable advantage of the virus infected host. The herbal medicine has a long traditional use and the major advantage over other medicines is their wide therapeutic window with rare side effects. There are some disadvantages of synthetic drugs like narrow therapeutic window and more importantly the various adverse side effects which occur quite frequently. Due to these disadvantages and other limitations, there is an increasing trend in the field of research for discovering new and noble drugs based on various herbal formulations. This review attempts to address the importance of developing therapeutic herbal formulations from various medicinal plants using the knowledge based on traditional system of medicines, the Ayurveda. Although natural products have been used by civilization since ancient times, only in recent decades has there been growing research into alternative therapies and the therapeutics use of natural products, especially those derived from plants. Plants synthesize and preserve a variety of biochemical products, many of which are extractable and used for various scientific investigations. Therefore, medicinal plants proved to be a major resort for the treatment of diseases and sicknesses by traditional healers in many societies