![Probiotics: also beneficial for the immune system?](https://img.passeportsante.net/1000x526/2015-11-09/i35225-les-probiotiques-benefiques-aussi-pour-le-systeme-immunitaire.gif)
November 2, 2004 – In addition to having a positive effect on the digestive system, probiotics also stimulate the immune system, allowing the body to better fight infections caused by bacteria, such asE. coli.
Knowing the major problems caused in recent years by this single bacterium in the water of the towns of Walkerton, Ontario, and Saint-Gabriel-de-Brandon, Quebec, Julia Green-Johnson’s lecture made perfect sense.
The scientist from the University of Ontario Institute of Technology explained that laboratory research shows that probiotics can affect the immune system in different ways. On the one hand, they stimulate it by increasing the activity of defense cells, such as macrophages and T cells. On the other hand, probiotics decrease inflammation and produce substances called bacteriocins, which act like antibiotics on pathogenic bacteria. But because bacteriocins are not absorbed by the body, they kill bad bacteria without destroying good bacteria.
Moreover, the Dr Guy Delespesse, an allergy and immunology specialist at the University of Montreal, argued that certain probiotics would reduce allergies in infants. Indeed, a study carried out on 132 patients tends to show that the use of probiotics – first in pregnant women and then in their newborns until the age of six months – halves the incidence of atopic eczema. A follow-up would have shown that at the age of four, the children in the treated group still benefited from the same protection. Atopic eczema in children is often associated with the development of asthma and other types of allergies.
It is important to specify that the effects reported during these conferences were obtained from particular strains of probiotics, isolated by researchers and marketed under their specific name.
Jean-Yves Dionne and Martin LaSalle – PasseportSanté.net