Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) - basically, recurrent pain during digestion - is common. A new study by Italian pediatricians asked if a probiotic would help. They randomized children into two groups: active and placebo. Children in the active group were given pills with lots of lactobacillus bacteria, which the children took twice per day. The placebo was made by the same manufacturer, so it looked identical. During the study, the researchers did not know who was in each group.

There was a big difference between the groups, which took about four weeks to emerge. The active group had painful episodes less than half as often as the placebo group, and the episodes they did have were less painful.

This supports my broad point that we need to eat plenty of fermented foods to be healthy. The authors of the study said nothing about fermented foods. They concluded:

Demonstration of the efficacy of a given probiotic for a specific therapeutic target will help clinicians choose which probiotic to use when dealing with a specific disease. We are entering the era of targeted probiotic use.