Malaria is still the most important parasitic disease in the world. Traditional
medicines have been used to treat malaria for thousands of years and are the source of
artemisinin and quinine derivatives. With the increasing levels of drug resistance, the
high cost of artemisinin-based combination therapies and fake antimalarial drugs,
traditional medicine has become an important and sustainable source of malaria
treatment in endemic areas. The use of herbal medicines believed to have therapeutic
properties is becoming increasingly widespread. These remedies are usually taken by
patients on their own initiative without prescription from a physician. The discovery and
use of natural compounds require a thorough investigation of their safety and efficacy
before their release into the market because herbal medicines present the greatest risk of
adverse effects relative to all complementary therapies. Nevertheless, natural products
have been a major source of new drugs due to the high diversity of their natural
compounds that often provide specific biological activities. In this chapter, we review
the results achieved in the use of extracts, fractions and compounds obtained from
natural sources that have antimalarial efficacy. We also provide a panoramic view of the
updated literature on the challenges and strategies associated with contemporary
antimalarial natural drug research.
Keywords: Antimalarial, antimalarial natural drug research, drug design, extracts,
herbal medicine, malaria, malaria complementary therapies, malaria treatment,
natural medicine, Plasmodium falciparum.
