Yakult is a probiotic beverage, which contains a specific strain of bacteria: Lactobacillus
casei Shirota (LCS).
The company claims that the bacteria is resistant to the harsh environment of the stomach, and
is able to reach the gut alive.
Once in the intestines, they act to exert various beneficial effects, which retain and
promote intestinal health.
First of all, the amount of probiotic in a bottle of yYakult is minuscule comparing to
the vast amount of good bacteria inside us already.
The company claims each bottle of Yakult has over 6.5 billion LCS in them.
Sounds like a lot right?
Let’s be generous and round it up to 10 billion, let’s make it more.
And let’s assume all 10 billion survive and travel to the intestine, what will they
see?
100 TRILLION good bacteria residing there saying hello to them, 10,000 times than the
lonely LCS brought by yakult.
It would be like hiring just 1 more man in a 10,000-person construction site, sure it
helps, but the amount of help it can offer is minimal comparing to the busy work the
originals are already offering.
Furthermore.
The 100 trillion are represented by some 5,000 different strains of bacteria.
We still don’t know exactly what many of which do other the fact that they are good
for us, and the composition of the strains are different from individuals to individuals.
And now Yakult throws in ONE single strain of bacteria (LCS) and claims that it can retain
and promote intestinal health.
It would be like you are making a giant dish and there’s already 5,000 ingredients, and
someone rushes in and adds one single pinch of something new in it and claims that it
helps making the dish as delicious as it is.
In principle yah it helps, and it certainly does change the composition of the dish, but
the help and change are virtually unnoticeable because of the vast amount of ingredients
that already exist.
We are not claiming Yakult is bad for your health.
What we are suggesting here is that even if the beverage works as it is advertised, the
effect will probably be so minuscule that it’s not worth it.
As Scientific America put it “The majority of studies to date have failed to reveal any
benefits (of consuming probiotic supplements) in individuals who are already healthy.”
If you have constipation or other intestinal disease, or recently take a lot of antibiotic
that wipes away a lot of your good bacteria, taking Yakult probably can help a little.
But if you are already healthy, like most of us.
Yakult probably wont do anything to you other than giving you a Coke can worth of sugar.
To drink or not, the decision in yours.