益生菌市場學

Clostridium difficile is the particularly nasty (惡意) bacterium which can cause an awful, life-threatening infection.

No doubt, a good diet and the avoidance of unnecessary antibiotics are fundamental to maintaining a healthy microbiota.

Tablets and drinks containing probiotics are available in the shops. Adverts declaring amazing results filled medical journals and newspapers.

The probiotics industry is a burgeoning (激增) one...Without actually promising it, manufacturers of many a little yogurt pot use clever marketing to suggest you will feel brighter, smarter, fresher, less bloated (飽脹的), more awake, happier and healthier if you down a Lactobacillus-enhanced drink or two each morning. Brands compete over the strains their products contain, and their supposed benefits.

True medications have to go through an expensive battery (一連串) of clinical trials before they're unleashed on the public...Clearly eating yogurt is safe, but what about effective? Can probiotics actually make you healthier and happier?

Among sixty-three well-designed clinical trials, including a total of nigh on 12,000 participants, it was found that probiotics significantly reduce the chance of developing antibiotic-associated diarrhea.

For fully-fledged (成熟) autoimmune and mental health conditions, like type one diabetes, multiple sclerosis and autism, the trouble with probiotics is probably that they are too little, too late.

Real, well-designed, peer-reviewed studies have found that probiotics of various brands, species and strains can indeed make you happier and healthier, improving mood, alleviating eczema and hay fever, lessening irritable bowel syndrome symptoms, preventing diabetes in pregnancy, curing allergies and even encouraging weight loss. Whilst most of these conditions are not cured together, at least not with just a few weeks or months of probiotic treatment, they do carry some benefit. To see a real effect of probiotics, though, prevention is certainly proving to be better than cure.

Three things matter when it comes to probiotics. Firstly, what species and strains does a product contain? Often, these are not detailed, or they do not match up with the true contents when they are cultured. Probably, the more species the better, though we have very little understanding of the impact of different strains on the body. Secondly, how many individual bacteria does a product contain? (Bacteria in large intestine originally are in huge number.) Thirdly, how are the bacteria packaged?...Many probiotics in yogurt form are accompanied by a fair dose of sugar, which may even tip the balance towards making them more unhealthy than healthy.

There is a treatment called fecal microbiota transplantation, bacteriotherapy or transpoosion. Take feces from one individual, and put them in the gut of another. It sounds disgusting, but we are not the first species to have the idea...

Treating Clostridium difficile with a single fecal transplant has a greater than eighty percent cure rate.

Whatever the species, and whatever the outcome, probiotics are a balm (安慰物). They pass through us, but they do not hang around for long. To reap (獲得) their benefits, you must keep taking them...

The benefits of prebiotics, whether isolated or in their original delicious packaging (particularly onions, garlic, leeks [韭蔥], asparagus [蘆筍] and bananas, to name a few), might be more wide-ranging than those of probiotics.

It is up to those of us whose internal ecosystems already reflect the biodiversity loss of planet Earth to turn things around for the sake of our children and grandchildren.

Collen, A. (2015) 10% Human: How Your Body's Microbes Hold the Key to Health and Happiness. London: William Collins.