Probiotics and AIDS Treatment

Publisher Summary This chapter discusses how the immunostimulatory properties of probiotics are helpful in the treatment of AIDS, thus improving quality of life. The HIV-infected children have no chance, as a healthy child does, to develop a balanced microfloral, for the most important gut first colonization happens through breast-feeding, followed by exposure to the environment, maternal flora, delivery characteristics, and the use of antibiotics. After 2 years of age, the gastrointestinal micro-biota has implications on the functional ability of gut flora to optimize its activities in nutrition, food and drugs absorption and metabolism, vitamin synthesis, defense, and education of the local immune system. Probiotics, a commensal bacteria, interact with the host immune system, acting as an important antigenic stimulus for the improvement of gut-associated lymphoid tissue, starting the local immune responses. The protection role of the microflora is mediated by a number of mechanisms, such as competitive exclusion, increasing normal intestinal barrier function, and stimulating immunoglobulin production. It has been proven that the microbiota has a positive impact on immune regulation. There are some studies relating to probiotics and immune-response through an increase in CD8+ and CD4+ in healthy women. However, the proof of probiotics' direct involvement needs to be studied further.