Really Low Culture: Is Yogurt Really Good for You?

Everyone knows that somewhere high in the mountains of Eurasia there is a people who eat nothing but yogurt and live to be several hundred years old. Or something like that. Now Dannon, "the top-selling brand of yogurt worldwide" is trying to take such legend to the bank, and it is running into a couple of obstacles, like a class action lawsuit arguing that health claims made in the company’s advertisements for its Activia and DanActive products are bogus. Writing in her health blog, Well, in the New York Times, Tara Parker-Pope talks about the squabble, and tries to find some evidence that "probiotic" food–food with live organisms- really does more good than food without live organisms.
"Although the scientific evidence shows that probiotics really can help," writes Parker-Pope,
"questions remain about how well that research translates into the real
world, where some marketers may add untested amounts of the bacteria to
various foods. While there are thousands of different probiotics, only
a handful have been tested in clinical trials and been shown to deliver
specific health benefits when eaten regularly."
Read more in Well.