The mechanism behind the antileishmanial effect of zinc sulphate. I. An in-vitro study.

In an attempt to determine the possible mechanism(s) behind the antileishmanial activity of zinc sulphate, promastigotes, axenic amastigotes and intracellular amastigotes of both Leishmania major and L. tropica were incubated with different concentrations of the compound. For each of the two Leishmania species, all three forms were found to be inhibited by the zinc sulphate, in a dose-dependent manner, the promastigotes being the most resistant form, followed by the axenic amastigotes. These results indicate that zinc sulphate has a direct antileishmanial effect. Compared with macrophages from starch-treated mice, the macrophages recovered from mice that had been injected intraperitoneally with zinc sulphate (daily for the 4 days prior to the macrophage collection) or BCG (once, 4 days before the cell collection) showed increased phagocytosis and increased killing of L. major and L. tropica. As the effects of the zinc sulphate were not statistically different from those of the known immunomodulating agent BCG, zinc sulphate appears to have an immunomodulating effect, in addition to its direct antileishmanial effect.