Food Matters Live Podcast · Food Matters Live

Food innovation and immune health

·56 min·2 clips

Dr. Berber Vliegboerstra's test for ultra-processed food: it contains an ingredient you cannot buy in a supermarket.

1. The Food Matters Live podcast records a live Rotterdam panel on how food innovation can support immune health across the lifespan, covering fermented foods, ultra-processed foods and the first 1000 days. 2. Speakers are Johan Garza (chair of Pharmacology at Utrecht University and chief scientific advisor at Danone), allergy dietitian Berber Vliegboerstra of OLVG, and Jana van Diepen of Reckitt Mead Johnson Nutrition, with Anthony Zahra as host. 3. The shared thesis is that diet, the gut microbiome and early-life programming shape a "resilient" immune system, with Garza naming non-communicable disease as "world health problem number one." 4. Garza describes "immune fitness," notes that vaccination response in people over 60 is around 60%, and reports that human milk oligosaccharides from a Grenoble milk library inhibited autoimmune diabetes onset in animal models. 5. Vliegboerstra, who has worked on allergies since 1987, cites the NOVA definition and Chris Tulligan's simpler one, and says ultra-processed foods are about 80% of supermarket products and over 60% of calories in Western diets. 6. She explains the epithelial barrier theory, in which emulsifiers such as polysorbate and CMC, sweeteners and advanced glycation end products are associated with a "leaky gut" and low-grade inflammation, while stressing that the evidence is association and not cause-effect. 7. In her clinic, instant porridge, ready-made sausages and pizza Hawaii worsened symptoms or triggered anaphylaxis, whereas homemade versions of the same foods were tolerated, and her team is running intervention studies in atopic dermatitis and peanut and nut allergy. 8. Van Diepen presents the HELMI study from Sweden, in which infants with low Bifidobacteria had higher risk of respiratory infections and allergies, and notes human milk contains 5 to 15 grams of oligosaccharides across more than 200 structures. 9. She reviews PDX/GOS prebiotics that raised Bifidobacteria and reduced respiratory infections in atopy-risk infants, LGG added to hydrolyzed formula that sped tolerance in cow's milk allergy, and postbiotics where a technical review found "no consistent evidence." 10. Suited to nutrition professionals, allergy dietitians and food-industry innovators interested in early-life immune health.

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