I've been following the gut microbiome space for close to 6 years now, and still am not convinced that there's anything humans can materially do to improve their gut microbiome, aside from eating more vegetables and less meat. Even the word "improve" is a misnomer - we don't quite know what's good bacteria and what's bad bacteria for a specific individual.
Additionally, as with all gut microbiome experiments - what happens in the lab in mice on mice might not translate to humans - and the human gut microbiome is extremely messy and tough to measure. We just don't have the longitudinal data across human populations to make quantifiable decisions about our gut microbiome.
I always like to draw the analogy to cigarettes and lung cancer. There's a very clear causal link to smoking and lung cancer after 20 years later. We don't have any such causal link between gut microbiome alterations and health outcomes.
Additionally, as with all gut microbiome experiments - what happens in the lab in mice on mice might not translate to humans - and the human gut microbiome is extremely messy and tough to measure. We just don't have the longitudinal data across human populations to make quantifiable decisions about our gut microbiome.
I always like to draw the analogy to cigarettes and lung cancer. There's a very clear causal link to smoking and lung cancer after 20 years later. We don't have any such causal link between gut microbiome alterations and health outcomes.
Happy to hear any other opinions!