Cladodes and fruits of Opuntia ficus-indica are used in traditional medicine for the treatment of abscess and skin inflammation. It was therefore interesting to assess whether an antileishmanial activity could be associated to skin healing. This study reports on the antileishmanial activity of Opuntia ficus-indica extracts from cladodes and fruits. Ethyl acetate extract from cladodes only exhibited an activity against Leishmania major with an IC50 value of 53.9 μg/mL, but ethyl acetate fruit extract, ethyl acetate cladode extract and methanol cladode extract were active also against Leishmania donovani with IC50 values at 70.3, 70.5 and 45.2 μg/mL, respectively. A poor activity of the fractions was monitored against Trypanosoma brucei brucei. Finally, a bioguided fractionation of fruits of Opuntia ficus-indica led to a pre-purified fraction that exhibited an IC50 of 9.3 μg/mL against Leishmania donovani intramacrophage amastigotes. The selectivity index defined as CC50/IC50 was higher than 10. In conclusion, the bioguided fractionation allowed to enhance the antileishmanial activity about ten-fold comparatively to those of the ethyl acetate fruit extract. Such an activity is worth of further investigations to identify the compounds responsible for the antileishmanial effect.
Extracts of cladodes and fruits of Opuntia ficus-indica exhibited a significant antileishmanial activity whereas a poor trypanocidal activity. The bioguided fractionation of fruits of Opuntia ficus-indica led to pre-purified fractions that were very active against L. donovani intramacrophage amastigotes. This is the first time that such an activity is described for this plant. Further studies will be focused on the isolation and identification of the active principle from sub-fraction F′5-5.