Background: Drug addiction triggers the infliction of a variety of diseases. Various subjects have indicated that during the withdrawal syndrome period, the immune system is weakened. Objectives: This studyaimedto investigate the changes inserumlevels of interferon-gamma (IFN- )andinterleukin-17 (IL-17) during the morphine withdrawal syndrome induced by 8 weeks of moderate exercise and their effects on the immune system function. Materials and Methods: Twenty-four male Wistar rats (220 10 g) were divided into four groups (n = 6): healthy control (HC), addicted control (AC), healthy trained (HT), and addicted trained (AT) groups. AC and AT groups were made addicted to morphine sulfate (0.4 mg/mL) in 21 days. To ensure their dependence on morphine, naloxone (3 mg/kg, i.p.) was injected into the body of a number of the rats. HT and AT groups were made to run on a treadmill 5 days per week for 8 weeks while time and speed gradually increased. Both prior to the exercises and 24 hours after the last training session, blood samples were collected from all the animals, and serum IFN- and IL-17 serum levels were measured using the ELISA method. This research was performed at the Bu-Ali Sina University, Hamadan, Iran. Results: After 8 weeks of exercise, a significant increase was observed in the serum IFN- level in the HT group (251.17 13.045) in comparison with the HC group (234 12.884) (P = 0.045). Furthermore, the serum IFN- level in the AT group (218.33 5.164) in comparison to the AC group (190.678.477) showed a significant increase (P = 0.000). In addition, the serum level of IFN- in the HT group showed a significant increase compared to the AT group (P = 0.000). After 8 weeks of exercise, there was a significant decrease in the serum IL-17 level in the HT group (22.674.46) compared with the HC group (38.177.68) (P = 0.005). In addition, a significant decrease was observed in serum IL-17 in the AT group (42.177.41) in comparison with the AC group (57.177.83)
