Euroscience Open Forum 2012

From a scientific standpoint, probiotics are defined as bacteria which, when consumed in adequate amounts, confer a health benefit on the host. But ‘probiotic’ is also a marketing term which has become very familiar to the general public as a result of polished advertising campaigns, which are all too often littered with vague health claims based on anecdotal or poorly conducted research, if indeed, any research at all.

It is difficult for any consumer to discriminate between those few probiotic strains for which there is rigorous scientific data supporting specific health benefits in humans, and those which are simply members of a ‘probiotic’ genus such as Bifidobacterium or Lactobacillus.

This workshop will involve scientists highlighting some of the best evidence to support a role for probiotics in human health, detaching scientific rigour from marketing hype.