Biobased Products for Viral Diseases

Abstract

Medicinal plants and many functional foods have a beneficial influence on human and animal health. Many studies provide scientific evidence for the traditional use of plant extracts, which demonstrates the importance of conserving medicinal plants as a resource for the discovery of new drugs or medicines. Plants or herbal products have been effective against different viral diseases or at least have minimized their effects. Thus, herbal medicines provide a rich tool for the production of new antivirals. Herbaceous plants, in particular, have been used for centuries against different diseases, including viral diseases, and have become an important source of new compounds for the treatment of viral diseases. Some plants and other organisms, their respective active ingredients and their use for various viral diseases, have been described. A range of medicinal plants, extracts and compounds isolated from plants or other organisms have been investigated. The literature is vast for natural products and bioactive agents in the control of viral diseases, revealing that traditional medicine has been confirmed and improved over the years. In fact, nature is a great source of antiviral compounds, from which it is possible to produce innovative therapies and products. In this chapter, the aim to address bioproducts obtained from extracts or molecules isolated from plants, or from other organisms, which have been listed as antivirals, presenting the findings in literature regarding their effects and potential use in treatments for various viral diseases, as well as, in the discovery of future new drugs have been highlighted.