Efficacy of Four spp. Extracts in an Animal Model of Cutaneous Leishmaniasis.

Leishmaniasis is a complex protozoa disease caused by genus (Trypanosomatidae family). Currently, there have been renewed interests worldwide in plants as pharmaceutical agents. In this study, the efficacy of spp. is assessed in an BALB/c mice model for experimental cutaneous leishmaniasis. Animals were infected with 5 × 10⁶ metacyclic promastigotes and 30-day post-infection, a treatment with 30 mg/kg of extracts or Glucantime (GTM) was applied intralesionally every four days to complete 5 doses. Neither death nor loss of weight higher than 10% was observed. All the tested extracts were able to control the infection, compared with the infected and untreated group. Jacq. extract showed the highest efficacy and was superior ( < 0.05) to GTM. Dunal., Dunal. and Andr. extracts demonstrated a similar effect ( > 0.05) to GTM. An increase of IFN-γ ( < 0.05) was displayed only by animals treated with compared to the group treated with a vehicle, while no differences ( > 0.05) were observed for IL-12. effects of extracts were demonstrated, suggesting that this genus could be further explored as a new antileishmanial alternative.