RESUMO
Haematological (blood) cancers are the cancers of the blood and lymphoid forming tissues which represents approximately 10% of all cancers. It has been reported that approximately 60% of all blood cancers are incurable. Despite substantial improvement in access to detection/diagnosis, chemotherapy and bone marrow transplantation, there is still high recurrence and unpredictable but clearly defined relapses indicating that effective therapies are still lacking. Over the past two decades, medicinal plants and their biologically active compounds are being used as potential remedies and alternative therapies for the treatment of cancer. This is due to their anti-oxidant, anti-inflammatory, anti-mutagenic, anti-angiogenic, anti-cancer activities and negligible side effects. These bioactive compounds have the capacity to reduce proliferation of haematological cancers via various mechanisms such as promoting apoptosis, transcription regulation, inhibition of signalling pathways, downregulating receptors and blocking cell cycle. This review study highlights the mechanistic and beneficial effects of nine bioactive compounds (quercetin, ursolic acid, fisetin, resveratrol, epigallocatechin gallate, curcumin, gambogic acid, butein and celastrol) as potential remedies for chemoprevention of haematological cancers. The study provides useful insights on the effectiveness of the use of bioactive compounds from plants for chemoprevention of haematological cancers.
RESUMO
Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) is a highly transmittable pathogenic viral infection that causes a disease known as COVID-19. It is a pandemic and public health challenge ravaging the world today. Unfortunately, with the daily increase of infected individuals, there is no known drug approved for the treatment of COVID-19. However, there are therapeutic drugs with the potentials to inhibit endocytic pathways, suppress ribonucleic acid (RNA) polymerase activities, and reduce the replication of SARS-CoV-2. These drugs modifications are aimed at reducing inflammation, time of recovery, and number of deaths. This review is aimed at providing updated information on the clinical manifestations, diagnosis, preventive measures and therapeutic drugs used against SARS-CoV-2. The finding of this review revealed that some of these drugs are transmembrane protease, serine 2, and angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 inhibitors with the capacity to block the entrance/replication of SARS-CoV-2 in a host cell and therefore, may be promising in preventing the spread and mortality of SARS-CoV-2. However, these drugs may cause detrimental health effects such as toxic and non-efficacy issues. Therefore great caution should be employed by health professionals when prescribing these drugs to COVID-19 patients.
