Antiviral Natural Products and Herbal Medicines
Despite the progress made in immunization and drug development, many viruses lack preventive vaccines and efficient antiviral therapies, which are often beset by the generation of viral escape mutants. Thus, identifying novel antiviral drugs is of critical importance and natural products are an excellent source for such discoveries. (Summary from Journal of Traditional and Complementary Med CoronaVirus CoV:)
CoV is an enveloped, positive-sense single-stranded RNA (ssRNA) virus belonging to the Coronaviridae family. There are no specific treatments for CoV infection and preventive vaccines are still being explored. Thus, the situation reflects the need to develop effective antivirals for prophylaxis and treatment of CoV infection.
The CoV family consists of several species and causes upper respiratory tract and gastrointestinal infections in mammals and birds. In humans, it mainly causes common cold, but complications including pneumonia and SARS can occur.[11] The known human CoV (HCoV) includes HCoV-229E, -OC43, -NL63, -HKU1, and the more widely known severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV) which caused a global threat with high mortality in 2003.[12] In 2012, the World Health Organization (WHO) designated a sixth type of HCoV infection identified as the Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) which is associated with high fatality.[13]
The above information is a summary from the Published Medical Article: J Tradit Complement Med. 2014 Jan-Mar; 4(1): 24–35. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SPt5u-u57fw