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26.12.2023

Yogurt may lower your body weight and blood pressure

Frequent consumption of yogurt may protect against obesity and high blood pressure. Portuguese scientists base this idea on an analysis of data collected in the American National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey in 1999-2014.

Study
The Portuguese, affiliated with the University of Porto, were initially curious about the health effects of probiotics. So they found out from 38,802 adult study participants whether they used foods or supplements containing probiotics - and how healthy they were.

Of all study participants, 13.1 percent fell into the category of probiotic users. The percentage of supplement users in that group was just over 5 percent, as many as 96 percent of probiotic users consumed yogurt. Yogurt usually contains the probiotic bacterium Lactobacillus themophilus. The study we are talking about now says more about traditional yogurt than about probiotic supplements.

This is a cross-sectional cohort study. All the annoying but correct objections that you can raise against epidemiological studies apply even more strongly to this type of research. We'll just say it honestly.

Results
Yogurt consumers were slightly less likely to be obese. They also had diabetes less often and high blood pressure less often.

Yogurt's protective effect against diabetes disappeared when the researchers brushed away the influence of other lifestyle factors. You can see this in the table below. Click on it for a larger version.

Conclusion
The Portuguese were only able to demonstrate a protective effect against obesity from supplements with probiotics. Yogurt not only protected against obesity but also against high blood pressure.

Conclusion
"Our study supports the possibility of gut microbiota modulation by the use of probiotics as an attractive therapeutic target to prevent and treat obesity and related cardiometabolic disorders", write the researchers.

"Future research should focus on understanding the gut microbiota ecosystem and on identifying individuals who benefit the most from selective modulation of microbiota."

Source:
Nutrients. 2019 Jun 28;11(7):1482.

More:
Low-fat yogurt enhances the effect of strength training 26.06.2021
Yogurt protects against heart attack, milk does not 06.11.2018
Most yogurts full of sugars 02.11.2018
Homemade yogurt is the best source of probiotics 30.08.2018

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