Probiotic supplements might not be universally-effective and safe: A review

Abstract

Last few decades have witnessed the unprecedented growth in the application of probiotics for promoting the general gut health as well as their inception as biotherapeutics to alleviate certain clinical disorders related to dysbiosis. While numerous studies have substantiated the health-restoring potentials for a restricted group of microbial species, the marketed extrapolation of a similar probiotic label to a large number of partially characterized microbial formulations seems biased. In particular, the individuals under neonatal stages and/or those with some clinical conditions including malignancies, leaky gut, diabetes mellitus, and post-organ transplant convalescence likely fail to reap the benefits of probiotics. Further exacerbating the conditions, some probiotic strains might take advantage of the weak immunity in these vulnerable groups and turn into opportunistic pathogens engendering life-threatening pneumonia, endocarditis, and sepsis. Moreover, the unregulated and rampant use of probiotics potentially carry the risk of plasmid-mediated antibiotic resistance transfer to the gut infectious pathogens. In this review, we discuss the safety perspectives of probiotics and their therapeutic interventions in certain at-risk population groups. The embodied arguments and hypotheses certainly will shed light on the fact why probiotic usage should be treated with caution.

Keywords: Adverse effects; Allergy; At-risk population; Compromised gut; Dietary supplements; Immunomodulation; Probiotics; Sepsis.