Science has certainly tried.15 In the 1930s, Japanese microbiologist Minoru Shirota led the quest by looking for hardy microbes that could reach the gut without first being destroyed by the stomach’s acids. He eventually homed in on a strain of Lactobacillus casei, grew it in fermented milk, and, in 1935, created the first bottle of the dairy drink called Yakult. Today, the company sells around 12 billion bottles a year, worldwide. Overall, the probiotics industry is a multi-billion-dollar business. Its products feed our stomachs along with our desire for ‘natural’ healthcare (even though many
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yakult
