In our study, a decreased plasma level of IL-15 was one of the factors differentiating drug-naïve patients at HIV-1 infection stage 3 coinfected with Mtb from the cases of drug-naïve patients at HIV-1 infection stage 3 and drug-naïve patients with Mtb monoinfection, supporting an earlier study [61]. Here, IL15 is linked to HIV-1 infection.