What are Probiotics and their benefits?

What are probiotics?
Your immune system is scattered throughout your body and incorporates your bone marrow, spleen, tonsils and lymph nodes. Interestingly, these immune tissues only make up 30% of your immune system; the remaining 70% 1 is actually located in your gut! The gut associated lymphoid tissue (or GALT) is your digestive tract’s immune system. It is made up of tissues that house and train your immune cells to understand what, when and how to fight against invaders. Babies are born with their GALT intact, however its protective actions are only triggered when beneficial bacteria colonise their gut. Beneficial bacteria stimulate the GALT into action to give you immune protection from the day you were born. It is important to keep the bacteria in your gut in a healthy balance - a healthy gut promotes an active, healthy immune system.

PROBIOTICS FOR IMMUNE HEALTH

Did you realise that probiotics can help keep you well in winter? Probiotics are beneficial bacteria that not only aid digestion in the gut – they can also boost immunity. Using probiotics can help to train your immune system to respond appropriately to potentially harmful invaders, such as bad bacteria and viruses. Your immune system uses the good bugs in your gut to help recognise whether it needs to mount an attack on an invader. Different strains of probiotics have different actions in the body, and certain strains have a more targeted action on your immune system than others. The specific strains, Lactobacillus plantarum (HEAL 9) and Lactobacillus paracasei (8700:2) have recently been shown to boost immunity by reducing the frequency and duration of colds in adults. If you want to stay healthy this winter, probiotics can give you right balance of friendly bacteria to keep your immune system firing.