Active Compounds and Antimalaria Properties of some Medicinal Plants in Indonesia – A Review

Indonesia is a tropical country rich with various types of plant that have been empirically used as alternative medicine, especially for malaria disease treatment. The discovery and development of malaria treatment are currently underway, given that there has been a lot of resistance to first-line malaria treatment. The case of resistance has spread around the world that cause many victims, including in Indonesia. With Indonesia has a good environment for the development of malaria disease, therefore it requires serious treatments to prevent the spreading of malaria. Several efforts have been made to reduce the death cases due to malaria in Indonesia, including the discovery of new compounds from nature that has antimalarial compound as a substitute for malaria's drugs that is known has resistance. Research for a new antimalarial compound from nature is based on the experience of Indonesian ancestors who usually used various plants to treat many kinds of disease. Furthermore, research for natural compound especially from Indonesia that has the potency as alternative treatment for malaria is expected to continue to be developed. Some types of plant, such as puspa leaves (Schima wallichii Korth), sernai leaves (Wedelia biflora), kembang bulan leaves (Tithonia diversifolia), bark of cempedak (Artocarpus champeden), and sambiloto leaves (Andrographis paniculata Nees) have long been used as alternative herbal treatments for malaria in various regions in Indonesia. These plants have been proven empirically efficacious as antimalarial medicine, and several studies haves been conducted on these plants to obtain active compounds that have antimalarial property.