ABSTRACT

Adansonia digitata has popular ethnomedicinal application in the treatment of malaria in sub-Saharan Africa. The present study sought to investigate the antimalarial and antioxidant effects of methanol and flavonoid-rich extracts of the stem bark on Plasmodium berghei-infected mice in vivo. Thirty-five male mice, weighing 18-20 g and randomly allocated into seven groups of five animals each were used. Group 1, which served as the positive control, was pretreated with 1 ml/kg of the vehicle (5% v/v tween 80), mice in groups 2 and 3 were pretreated with 5 mg/kg b.wt of the standard drugs: chloroquine and arthemter/lumfantrine respectively, groups 4 and 5 were pretreated with 200mg/kg and 400 mg/kg methanol extract of A. digitata (ADME) respectively while groups 6 and 7 were administered 200mg/kg and 400 mg/kg flavonoid-rich extract of A. digitata (ADFE)respectively. Drugs were administered by oral gavage once daily for five consecutive days before intraperitonial transfection of mice with an inoculum size of 1x 107of P.berghei. Blood was withdrawn from animals for the quantification of packed cell volume (PCV) and parasitemia. Animals were anaesthetized with ether 72 h after transfection, dissected and the livers quickly excised to prepare the homogenate used to evaluate the extent of membrane lipid peroxidation and level of reduced glutathione (GSH). ADME and ADFE treatment caused significant (P