The Antimicrobial Activity of Three Medicinal Plants on Clinical Diarrhoagenic Strains of Salmonella and Shigela

The major objective to evaluate the antibacterial activity of 3 medicinal plants (Gardinea lutea, Olea europaea, Myrica salisfolia) against clinical isolates of Shigella and Salmonella and a control strain E. coli and compare it with modern antibiotics.

Study design The study subjects were both male and female patients in the range of age between 0-14 yrs, visiting the hospital because of having infectious diarrhoea. The (MIC) of the three medicinal plants extracts including their semi purified fractions, and modern antibiotics were determined, using the standard agar dilution method.

Results and lessons learned From. The two plants (G. lutea and M. salicfolia) have shown relatively better MIC value, particularly against the clinical isolates of Shigella and Salmonella species. The range of MIC, where antishigella activity was recorded for both the crude and butanol fraction of G. lutea was between 2000μg/ml - 250μg/ml and the range of MIC for both the crude and fractionated extracts M. salisfolia is greater than or equal 1000μg/ml for both clinical isolates of Shigella and Salmonella. As compared to the result of modern antibiotics, it can be suggested that, the plant extracts have shown weak activity with low MIC values. Among the antibiotics, tetracycline, has shown MIC value of >200 μg/ml, for both Salmonella and Shigella. While chloramphinicol has shown MIC value of <600μg/ml for Salmonella isolates and >150μg/ml for Shigella isolates. The least MIC value was obtained for norfloxacin with MIC value of > 0.43μg/ml with 100% growth inhibition for Shigella and Salmonella.

Relevance or importance Further investigations could enhance, especially for the antimicrobial activity of the semi purified butanol fractionates of G. lutea and M. salisfolia.