Stop wasting your time and money on probiotics! There’s a more intelligent way to support your microbiome.
There are various products in the marketplace which contain “probiotics”. Drinks, foods like yogurt and of course dietary supplements. Many millions of people follow the uninformed heard, consuming these products in the hopes of addressing rampant gastrointestinal issues. But have they been helping you?
There’s always some company trying to sell you their new magical strain or blend. But instead of buying yet another probiotic in a long list of failed attempts to better your health, hear me out.
But first, what exactly are probiotics? They are thought of as “good” bacteria. But are they? In most products you’ll find one or more species from only two genera, Bifidobacterium and what we’ll call Lactobacillus. I say that, because many of these species were recently reclassified into other similar sounding genera, but that’s a technicality you don’t care about and is not relevant to our conversation. So, we’ll just refer to these as Lactobacillus.
Bifidobacterium is a health-promoting genus. I have plenty of data to show that. But there are many other health-promoting bacteria within your GI tract which are equally, or often times even more beneficial. These bacteria have names you’ve never heard of before, names like Faecalibacterium prausnitizii, Roseburia, Coprococcus, Eubacterium rectale and more. Out of about 1,500 different species in your gut, it is these bacteria which largely determine your health. They don’t exist as probiotics, but you can feed them the fuels they love.
And here’s some good news. When you feed these amazing bacteria with various prebiotics like inulin, partially hydrolyzed guar gum and arabinoxylans, you’re also feeding species from Bifidobacterium. In addition, the Bifidobacterium species which you’re feeding in your microbiome are established viable residents. Whereas the engineered Bifidobacterium in your probiotics won’t take up residence, which implies that you’re a lifetime customer.
Lactobacillus on the other hand is a very different story. The Lactobacillus cult got started with Ilya Mechnikov in the Rhodope mountains in southern Bulgaria. It was purported that the fermented dairy products helped the locals to live long and healthy lives. This has since been disproven, as common factors among other blue zones have been attributed to their health.
But much more than that, over many years, I’ve done complete meta-analyses of the microbiomes in all major health conditions/diseases. Would you be surprised to know that in Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS), Lactobacillus is significantly higher in IBS subjects as compared to healthy controls in the vast majority of the scientific papers, when a significant difference was found for the genus. This is also true for Crohn’s disease, ulcerative colitis, Parkinson’s disease, autism, type 2 diabetes, obesity, cardiovascular disease, liver health, and COVID. Even when we look at healthy aging, in my meta-analysis of centenarians (those who live to 100), including frail vs non-frail elderly, Lactobacillus is not a factor in this equation. Then which taxa do factor into this equation of healthy aging? Well, in addition to the health-promotors I mentioned previously, other bacteria are at play such as Prevotella, Eubacterium, Blautia, Akkermansia and Odoribacter. Again, names of which you’re not familiar.
If we look at the dreaded C-diff infection, where does Lactobacillus land here? In my meta-analysis of 30 human fecal microbiome research papers covering various facets of C-diff, when a significant difference was found for Lactobacillus, 100% of the time, it was associated with C-diff. Its C-diff profile was just like the profile of other known opportunistic pathogens (bad guys) such as Enterococcus, Klebsiella, Veillonella and Escherichia (that’s where E coli comes from).
So, if Lactobacillus abundance is so consistently high in all of these major conditions, why in the world would you think it’s going to help with your dysbiotic gut? It’s certainly not helping any of these other people. I know, this information is new, shocking and overwhelming. That’s the point. That’s why I’m uniquely qualified. I know things that others don’t. So let me help you.
There’s a smarter way to go about this. As the former director of medical education for a microbiome firm, I’ve now launched my own platform to truly educate you on the microbiome, and how it pertains to your gastrointestinal concerns and your overall health. I’ve had amazing success over the years, and my knowledge base is now available to you. So, watch my free presentation entitled, “Probiotics – Don’t Waste your Time or your Money.” You can find this presentation on my YouTube channel or in the Microbiome University tab on my website. And if you’re still hungry for more information after that, I have something on every conceivable topic on the microbiome, and I show you the data to support everything I say. Is anyone else doing that?
In our world as it is, we all now have to be our own health advocates. With a broken government, food and medical system, you need to take charge of your healthcare. So, educate yourself, as best you can. This is why I’ve launched my educational platform. For you. If you think your health would be well served by addressing your microbiome, you can visit the Protocols tab on my website, and for the mere price of a cup of coffee, you can find a science-based protocol which may dramatically improve your quality of life.
