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COVID-19, an infectious disease, has emerged as one of the leading causes of death worldwide, making it one of the severe public health issues in recent decades. nCoV, the novel SARS coronavirus that causes COVID-19, has brought together scientists in the quest for possible therapeutic and preventive measures. The development of new drugs to manage COVID-19 effectively is a challenging and time-consuming process, thus encouraging extensive investigation of drug repurposing and repositioning candidates. Several medications, including remdesivir, hydroxychloroquine, chloroquine, lopinavir, favipiravir, ribavirin, ritonavir, interferons, azithromycin, capivasertib and bevacizumab, are currently under clinical trials for COVID-19. In addition, several medicinal plants with considerable antiviral activities are potential therapeutic candidates for COVID-19. Statistical data show that the pandemic is yet to slow down, and authorities are placing their hopes on vaccines. Within a short period, four types of vaccines, namely, whole virus, viral vector, protein subunit, and nucleic acid (RNA/DNA), which can confer protection against COVID-19 in different ways, were already in a clinical trial. SARS-CoV-2 variants spread is associated with antibody escape from the virus Spike epitopes, which has grave concerns for viral re-infection and even compromises the effectiveness of the vaccines. Despite these efforts, COVID-19 treatment is still solely based on clinical management through supportive care. We aim to highlight the recent trends in COVID-19, relevant statistics, and clinical findings, as well as potential therapeutics, including in-line treatment methods, preventive measures, and vaccines to combat the prevalence of COVID-19.

According to WHO report, globally about 10 million active tuberculosis cases, resulting in about 1.6 million deaths, further aggravated by drug-resistant tuberculosis and/or comorbidities with HIV and diabetes are present. Incomplete therapeutic regimen, meager dosing, and the capability of the latent and/or active state tubercular bacilli to abide and do survive against contemporary first-line and second line antitubercular drugs escalate the prevalence of drug-resistant tuberculosis. As a better understanding of tuberculosis, microanatomy has discovered an extended range of new promising antitubercular targets and diagnostic biomarkers. However, there are still no new approved antitubercular drugs of routine therapy for several decades, except for bedaquiline, delamanid, and pretomanid approved tentatively. Despite this, innovative methods are also urgently needed to find potential new antitubercular drug candidates, which potentially decimate both latent state and active state mycobacterium tuberculosis. To explore and identify the most potential antitubercular drug candidate among various reported compounds, we focused to highlight the promising lead derivatives of isoniazid, coumarin, griselimycin, and the antimicrobial peptides. The aim of the present review is to fascinate significant lead compounds in the development of potential clinical drug candidates that might be more precise and effective against drug-resistant tuberculosis, the world research looking for a long time.

The methanolic extract of aerial parts of Tithonia tubaeformis showed significant antioxidant activity in DPPH assay. It was subjected to bioassay guided fractionation affording more active ethyl acetate fraction which on further purification led to the isolation and identification of a series of bioactive phenolic compounds having important biosynthetic relationship. Of these, 4-hydroxyphenethyl henicosanoate (tithonoid) is a new compound. Moreover, in the carrageenan induced paw edema test, significant attenuation of inflammation was also produced by the extract at 50-200 mg/kg. The structures of all the constituents were determined through spectroscopic methods. It is the first systematic biological and chemical investigation on T. tubaeformis, which showed that phenolics may play an important role in the antioxidant and anti-inflammatory activity of the plant, probably through synergism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Present study was aimed to enlighten the antimicrobial and cytotoxic activity of Haplophyllum gilesii (Hemsl.) C.C. a narrow endemic plants of northern areas of Pakistan. The antimicrobial potential of H. gilesii extracts in different solvents was assessed using agar well diffusion method against bacterial and fungal strains, while cytotoxic activity was studied in the methanolic extract using brine shrimp's lethality assay. All the extracts showed significant biological activity against Gram positive, Gram negative bacteria and selected fungal strains. Acetone, chloroform and methanolic extracts showed maximum activity i-e 39mm, 44mm and 35mm followed by ethyl acetate 27mm and n-hexane 26mm against microorganisms studied. Standard antibiotics were used as a positive control for bacteria and fungi respectively. The cytotoxic assay results showed that methanolic extracts of stem and root of H. gilesii had toxic effects on brine shrimp larvae with LD50 values of 116.72 µg/ml and 168.16 µg/ml respec tively. The antimicrobial and cytotoxic parameters reported can be considered as quality standards of H. gilesii in herbal industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights from the article: Chemical analysis of leaves and roots extracts revealed the presence of alkaloids, saponins, cardiac glycosides, Analysis of aqueous methanolic extracts and crude saponins isolated from leaves and roots of Sarcococca Saligna. Table 2: Antibacterial screening of S. saligna aqueous methanolic extracts of leaves and roots as well as crude saponins Table 3: Antifungal screening of S. saligna aqueous methanolic extracts of leaves and roots as well as crude saponins.