The importance of digestive health

Our digestive system (gut) is central to supporting our health – it contains more than 70% of the body’s immune system cells and 10 times more bacteria than we have cells in our whole body.

This bacteria is made up of many different species, some of which are considered friendly and others termed pathogenic. The bacteria line the gut wall and help to stop toxins and harmful substances passing through the gut into the body – so ideally, we need a lot more good than bad. The ideal ratio has been estimated at 85% good to 15% bad bacteria and if this balance is affected it may lead to digestive symptoms such as bloating or irritable bowel syndrome (IBS).

The stresses of our modern lifestyles have been shown to have an impact on reducing the levels of friendly bacteria and potentially give the pathogenic bacteria a chance to become dominant. Stressors include a high sugar intake, lack of or too much exercise, illness (especially food poisoning) and medications (particularly antibiotics), environmental toxins and lack of nutrients.

Good digestive health is linked to the balance of this bacteria and friendly bacteria supplements can help to maintain this balance. Some of the key elements to look for include:

• Human strains
• Clearly defined strain numbers
• Evidence that the bacteria survive stomach and bile acids
• Bacteria supported by research
• Multi-strain
• Survival at room temperature
• Guaranteed bacteria count to expiry

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