Antibacterial activity in plants used as chewing sticks in Africa

In Africa, chewing sticks are the most common means of maintaining oral hygiene, and roots, stems and twigs of numerous plants are employed for this purpose. Chewing sticks are recommended for oral hygiene by the World Health Organization, and some of them, or their extracts, are also used in the ethnomedical treatment of oral infections. Primary screens have demonstrated that extracts from many chewing sticks have antimicrobial activity against a broad spectrum of microorganisms, including those commonly implicated in orofacial intections. Some chewing stick extracts have additional activities. Preparation, extraction and a screening methodologies are largely unstanized and bioactivity-guided fractionation has only been can ducted on a few chewing stick extracts. It is thereion highly likely that many chewing sticks contain secondary metabolites with as yet unreported antimicrobial activity. Antimicrobial principles that have been identified include novel flavenoid compounds and alkaloids. Chewing sticks offer considerable and underexploited potential as sources of new antimicrobial backbones.