COVID-19, transmitted by SARS-CoV-2, is one of the most serious pandemic situations in the history of mankind, and has already infected a huge population across the globe. This horrendously contagious viral outbreak was first identified in China and within a very short time it affected the world's health, transport, economic, and academic sectors. Despite the recent approval of a few anti-COVID-19 vaccines, their unavailability and insufficiency along with the lack of other potential therapeutic options are continuing to worsen the situation, with valuable lives continuing to be lost. In this situation, researchers across the globe are focusing on repurposing prospective drugs and prophylaxis such as favipiravir, remdesivir, chloroquine, hydroxychloroquine, ivermectin, lopinavir-ritonavir, azithromycin, doxycycline, ACEIs/ARBs, rivaroxaban, and protease inhibitors, which were preliminarily based on in vitro and in vivo pharmacological and toxicological study reports followed by clinical applications. Based on available preliminary data derived from limited clinical trials, the US National Institute of Health (NIH) and USFDA also recommended a few drugs to be repurposed i.e., hydroxychloroquine, remdesivir, and favipiravir. However, World Health Organization later recommended against the use of chloroquine, hydroxychloroquine, remdesivir, and lopinavir/ritonavir in the treatment of COVID-19 infections. Combining basic knowledge of viral pathogenesis and pharmacodynamics of drug molecules as well as in silico approaches, many drug candidates have been investigated in clinical trials, some of which have been proven to be partially effective against COVID-19, and many of the other drugs are currently under extensive screening. The repurposing of prospective drug candidates from different stages of evaluation can be a handy wellspring in COVID-19 management and treatment along with approved anti-COVID-19 vaccines. This review article combined the information from completed clinical trials, case series, cohort studies, meta-analyses, and retrospective studies to focus on the current status of repurposing drugs in 2021.

Malaria is a serious illness resulted from parasites that are communicated to people through the bites of infected female Anopheles mosquitoes. Malaria is still in a worrying trend, particularly in tropical and subtropical climates although it is curable and preventable. In spite of a noteworthy abetment in incidence and death rates caused by malaria, even in 2017, a big number of people (219 million) have been affected by it along with 435 thousand confirmed death cases. Though a lot of synthetic drugs have been commercialized to treat malaria, those are compromised with some serious side effects. On the contrary, plant sources are always getting a big focus to develop novel and effective therapeutics in the treatment of different ailments i.e. quinine and artemisinin to treat malarial complications. The usage of herbal plants against malaria has also a very ancient root. Several families of plant species have showed potential antimalarial activities in previous research works. In this review work, families of these plants have been compiled so that prospective researchers can find a hint to discover more effective and safer plant-derived therapeutic options against malaria. Bangladesh Pharmaceutical Journal 24(2): 180-193, 2021