Episode 004

Summary:

Anita Johansen, CEO, and Caroline Montelius, the head of scientific affairs for Sweden’s Probi AB join us to share the game-changing potential of probiotics – what they are, how they can support a healthy lifespan, and how, as consumers, we can determine which probiotics might be best to get started with.

Key Take-aways:

About Probi AB
Probi focuses on developing, producing, and delivering clinically proven probiotics.
Since its founding at Sweden’s Lund University, in 1991, Probi has expanded its presence to more than 40 markets and holds more than 400 patents globally. 

You’re mostly probiotics!
There are around 30% more probiotic bacteria in our bodies than the number of our own cells. And scientists are uncovering more and more evidence that the balance of bacteria species in your gut influences the brain but also our cardiovascular or metabolic health and other things, even the skin. Today, we know we can minimise such problems by supplementing with probiotics in food and beverages.

Probiotics are trending
Probiotics research and market uptake are skyrocketing: In the past 6 months (Dec 2023-May 2024), more than 2500 publications have appeared discussing the effects on different diseases. New evidence is constantly surfacing about new correlations.

Probiotics aren’t medicine
Probiotics are typically used as ingredients that are being used in foods and in food supplements. They aren’t something that is intended to cure a disease or change anything that is a disease. They are, instead, a supplement to the food where specific benefits have been shown. It’s very similar to a vitamin or mineral that is also well known for many people.

Growing strong – staying strong
Normally, as we grow, we increase our bone formation as part of growing, then we arrive at a steady state before we being to experience a gradual breakdown in our bones. This is more prevalent for women when entering menopause, when there is a big drop in our bone formation, and bone loss becomes prevalent. By adding probiotic strains that have been researched for quite some years now, we can see that these specific strains positively affect the formation of bones.

The gut microbiome
What is the optimal microbiome? We don’t know that today. There no fully laid-out maps of a healthy microbiome – which, in any case, is likely to differ from person to person. So it is still being explored, and we may never get there. However, it often starts with people having gut health issues, perhaps indicating that we are in a stressful environment, And this is also an indication of an unbalanced gut microbiota. Probiotics supplements can help by increasing the prevalence of certain bacteria that have been shown to have a clinical benefit.

How to choose your probiotics
It’s difficult for consumers to find the products that they need. This differs from country to country, but legislation is not yet where it should be. So today, it’s hard for manufacturers to talk about the benefits of the ingredients they provide with probiotics. When you go into the store intending to buy a probiotic, what you should ask is: is it the specific probiotic strain in the product that I’m looking at? Is it scientifically documented? Are there any scientific clinical studies backing the benefits that they are claiming on this product?

Meet probiotics pioneer, Bengt Jepsson
78 year-old Bengt is a co-founder of Probi, and he’s still actively involved with the company. Originally working as a surgeon in Sweden, Bengt began to explore why many patients were septic without there being any immediately identifiable source of the problem. His journey led him to try applying probiotics – experimenting on himself first – before he teamed up with microbiologists and others to turn his early findings into a rapidly expanding field of research.