The wellness project claims to help users make ‘smarter food choices’ based on ‘world-leading science’. But many scientists claim its fee-based services are no better than generic advice
our body is unique, so is the food you need.” This is the central credo of personalised nutrition , as professed by its leading UK advocate, the health science company Zoe. Since its launch in April 2022, 130,000 people have subscribed to the service – at one point it had a waiting list of 250,000 – which uses a pin prick blood test, stool sample and a wearable continuous glucose monitor to suggest “smarter food choices for your body”.
Another problem is that personalised nutrition research bases a good deal of its findings on analysis of mountains of data collected by its users. This throws up lots of associations between diet, blood glucose levels, weight and so on. But these “cross-sectional” studies can only ever find associations, not causation. So the existence of an association between greater spikes and higher average blood glucose levels, even in healthy people, does not tell us anything about causation.
Most importantly, there simply is no such thing as good and bad bacteria, period. A bacterium may do good in one person and bad in another. Take the example of, found in most guts. This is a species with much variation. Jacques Ravel, professor of microbiology and immunology at the University of Maryland, explains: “There are somethat are going to give you major diarrhoea, and there are some that are essential for your wellbeing.
Misra says she doesn’t buy this. “There are well designed studies that are gamechangers, that actually change outcomes for people in a compelling way and that are cost-effective and change policy. I can give you numerous examples.” One is the research into low-calorie diets, intended to push type 2 diabetes into remission. “That was a randomised controlled trial, a very high-impact study. Within three years of that finding,Zoe also blurs another important distinction.
More importantly, the study compared Zoe participants with a control group who were far from blind tested. They were simply given standard dietary advice and a helpline to call. It was entirely predictable that people who logged every meal with Zoe for 18 weeks would eat more healthily. Nor was the study group as a whole representative of the general population: 86% were women and their average body mass index was 34 when anything over 30 is considered to be obese.
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