FIR Episode 18: Can probiotics strengthen my immunity?

“I wondered if probiotics could help strengthen my immunity?”

The answer is yes, probiotics can strengthen your immunity.

In this Free and Inspired radio episode, we’re getting up to date with how different probiotics might help you build your immune response.

Philip also helps you learn more about how the immune system works.

For instance, did you know that probiotics can help with upper respiratory infections?! 

“The easiest way to look at how probiotics help is by bringing balance to the bacterial community or microbiome. This balance assists with viral, allergic, and other conditions like inflammatory bowel disease and autoimmune disorders.”

Philip looks at the two different types of immune responses and how probiotics bring balance to both of them. 

For example, this balance allows the body to tolerate many potential antigens entering the body via the food we eat or the air we breathe. Probiotics can also help the specific immune cells that help us fight infections.

Another way probiotics can help to boost your immune defence is by secreting compounds that suppress the growth of organized crime, like gram-negative bacteria in the gut.

For example, suppressing gram-negative bacteria and their compounds called lipopolysaccharides (LPS) is a great way to use probiotics to improve your immunity. 

Whilst reducing an overactive immune response, such as the one that occurs in allergies.

In the second half of the show, Philip looks at specific instances where probiotics help, such as in cases of viral and upper respiratory infections, like colds and flu.

Philip also introduces the gut and lung axis and explores how probiotics and bacteria influence this connection.

All this and more in this episode of Free and Inspired radio!