Money talks and we listen. Since the year 2000, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (over 50 billion USD in assets) has poured billions into tackling the world’s most pressing health problems such as malaria and infectious disease. Now the philanthropists are embracing gut microbes. Like most of us in the probiotic industry, Bill and Melinda Gates believe in the promise of […]
Microbiome Environment
New Paper Takes on Probiotic Swipes
Are Probiotics Money Down the Toilet? Or Worse? Albeit with a provocative title destined to be click-bait, this January 2019 article in Journal of American Medical Association looks seriously at the science. It dissects the two recent studies from Israel which raised questions about probiotic use. Author Jennifer Abbasi does a good job of teasing out implications of the work published […]
FDA Cracks Down on Supplements
As those in the probiotic supplement industry know, business is booming. Likewise, dietary supplements in general have grown from 4,000 products just 25 years ago to about 80,000 today. These sheer numbers in addition to uncovered shenanigans—ginkgo-free gingko supplements in one example—has led the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to announce strengthened regulation. […]
Iron Supplements Can Mess with Microbes
Iron is the go-to treatment for anemia. Troubling though is the dysbiosis it can cause. Iron favors strains of pathogenic species over more healthful ones. In the genital tract, for instance, Gardnerella vaginalis, Trichomonas vaginalis and Candida albicans require iron for adhesion. Most lactobacilli, which maintain a healthy vaginal ecosystem, do not. And in another example […]
Healthy Baby Microbes Shut Down Food Allergy
Frequent fliers know that peanuts are often forbidden in flight–an allergic reaction to foods such as peanuts can be fatal. Other common allergens in the food category include cow’s milk, eggs, soy, wheat, and tree nuts. And if it seems like their incidence is increasing, it’s not just your internet exposure: The prevalence of food […]
Sweet: Mother’s Microbes Shape Breastmilk Sugars
Human milk oligosaccharides (HMOs) are sugar molecules found only in breast milk—not in formula and certainly not in milk from other animals. A newborn can’t digest HMOs. However, certain species in his microbiome can and in the process change the composition of said microbiome. Because of this effect, researchers are looking at HMOs to see if […]