Traditional Medicine against Zika Virus Infection

Visiting Professor, Hainan Medical University, China

^*Corresponding Author:

Viroj Wiwanitkit
Visiting Professor, Hainan Medical University
China
Tel: +1-(302)-703-1005
E-mail: wviroj@yahoo.com

Received date: December 20, 2016; Accepted date: December 23, 2016; Published date: January 12, 2017

Citation: Wiwanitkit V (2017) Traditional Medicine against Zika Virus Infection. J Tradit Med Clin Natur 6:e127.

Copyright: © 2017 Wiwanitkit V. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

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Editorial

The emerging Zika virus infection becomes the big global issue and the worldwide epidemic leads to a great concern. To manage the disease is very difficult since the disease has multimodal transmission. There is still no effective drug or vaccine against Zika virus infection. There is still no effective treatment as well as prevention regarding Zika virus infection. In fact, as an arbovirus infection, the lack of specific antiviral drug is the big problem. Nevertheless, the local wisdom against the arbovirus infection should be mentioned. The classical wisdom might be the clue for the present crisis of Zika virus infection. Focusing on the highly similar infection, dengue, there are some traditional regimens against it. The interesting aspect is the use of papaya against the infection. There are many reports showing that papaya is useful for management of dengue infection. Nevertheless, there is a recent publication showing the effectiveness of Chinese traditional regimen against Zika virus infection [1,2]. Deng et al. reported that “After receiving symptomatic treatment and antiviral treatments including Xiyanping injection, the patient’s symptoms were relieved [3].” It is no doubt that the traditional medicine can be another hope for management of the present Zika virus infection crisis.

For the possible application of traditional medicine against Zika virus infection, these are the important concerns. First, there should be a collection on the knowledge on available traditional medicine regimens. The regimens that have been claimed or known for the antiviral properties should be the basic focuses. Second, there should be the in silico, in vitro and in vivo trial for assessment of those regimens’ properties against the Zika virus. Final, the candidate regimens that pass the trial can be further processed as the new hope for antiviral regimen against Zika virus infection. These can be further expanded into macro pharmaceutical scale. The hope for using of traditional medicine against the Zika virus infection is interesting and can be the new facet of modern medicine against the new emerging infection.

References

1. Charan J, Saxena D, Goyal JP, Yasobant S (2016) Efficacy and safety of Carica papaya leaf extract in the dengue: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Int J Appl Basic Med Res 6: 249-254.
2. Ansari RM (2016) Extract of Carica papaya L. leaves: Standardising its use in dengue fever. Indian J Pharmacol 48: 338-339.
3. Deng Y, Zeng L, Bao W, Xu P, Zhong (2016)  Experience of integrated traditional Chinese and Western medicine in first case of imported Zika virus disease in China. Zhonghua Wei Zhong Bing JiJiu Yi Xue 28: 106-109.