Most 'Probiotic' Foods Aren't Actually Probiotic | Dr Maria Marco

About this episode

The word gut health is on almost everything now, from yoghurt lids to supplement labels. So I asked food microbiologist Dr Maria Marco, Professor at UC Davis and President of the International Scientific Association for Probiotics and Prebiotics, what it actually means. She spent a year with a panel of clinicians, dieticians, and immunologists trying to define it, and the most striking finding was how much we still cannot measure. This is a conversation about the distance between the science and the marketing, and it includes some claims that will change how you read a label. What we cover The consensus definition of gut health, and why symptoms and pathology can point in opposite directions Whether commercial microbiome stool tests and diversity scores mean anything clinically Why sauerkraut sold as probiotic is, in Maria's words, "just a marketing thing" Whether the microbes in yoghurt survive digestion, colonise your gut, or simply pass through Why dead and pasteurised microbes may still be beneficial How to choose a probiotic that has actually been tested in people, and when to stop taking one Maria is unusually willing to say what we do not yet know, and