One product, one panel, one record.
Bio-K+ Extra Care Probiotic Capsules (80 Billion CFU) — label audit
When Bio-K+ actually wants to build a sex-specific product it changes the strains — its Women's Health SKU swaps the entire formula to GR-1 and RC-14 — but for men it changed nothing and wrote an FAQ heading, on a catalogue whose own search engine returns "No results found for 'men'."
This page is an audit of a label. It records what this product’s panel discloses, what of that could be checked against a primary record, and what could not. The score below ranks this product on that disclosure and on nothing else.
The record this page rests on
- NIH label record
- Label read on
- The most recent dated artefact behind this page. Labels change; this is how old our reading of it is.
- Cohort
- Addendum — outside the founding denominators Torn down 2026-07-31, after the founding cohort of 27 was frozen. It sits outside every D27 denominator the site publishes.
- How deep this went
- Full forensic teardown Panel transcribed, every strain designator queried, every certification chased to its issuer’s own register, and the literature behind each marketing claim opened and read.
The Label Verifiability Score for this product
66.0 out of 100
Rank 59 of the 154 products in this audit the rubric can score. This rank is shared with 6 other products — 7 products sit on 66.0 and are tied. They hold the position jointly; no tiebreaker is applied, because every tiebreaker available here would be a number the rubric deliberately refused to weigh, smuggled back in to make a list look tidier.
The score measures one thing: how much of what you are buying this company tells you, and how much of that survives being checked against a source that is not the company. It does not measure whether the product works — this site holds no efficacy data of its own, and 0 of 294 organism slots in the founding cohort carry a strain with a human randomised trial for any male-specific outcome, so nobody in this category has evidence that would support a ranking by effect.
Computed over the whole rubric: this record answers all five questions below, so nothing is renormalised away and the divisor is the full 1.00. That share travels with every score on this site and is never dropped — a score over part of the rubric’s weight and the same score over all of it are different claims.
| Component | Weight | What was counted, and where | Fraction | Weight × fraction |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Strain identity printed on the panel | 0.24 | 3 of 3 organism slots carry a printed strain designator. | 3 / 3 = 1.0000 | 0.2400 |
| Per-organism amount printed | 0.20 | 0 of 3 organism slots have an amount of its own; the rest are inside a blend total. | 0 / 3 = 0.0000 | 0.0000 |
| What the CFU count is measured against | 0.22 | Potency basis "through-expiry": CFU figure printed yes, single basis stated yes, basis reaches expiry yes — 3 of 3. | 3 / 3 = 1.0000 | 0.2200 |
| Printed designators that lead to a human trial | 0.20 | 3 of 3 checked organism slots resolve to at least one human randomised trial under the designator exactly as printed. This counts whether the identity leads to a trial, never what the trial found. | 3 / 3 = 1.0000 | 0.2000 |
| Certification confirmed at the issuer’s own register | 0.14 | 1 claimed certification queried at the issuer’s register and not listed there. | 0 / 1 = 0.0000 | 0.0000 |
0.6600 — the last column added up — divided by 1.00, the weight this record could answer, is 0.6600. Multiplied by 100 and rounded to one decimal, that is the 66.0 above.
See this product’s row in the full ranking, alongside the other 153 scored products, or read what each of the five components asks and how to check it .
What this label discloses
Everything in this table is what the product itself states — on the printed panel, on the brand’s own page, or in the label record the manufacturer filed. Nothing in it is checked yet; checking is the next section.
| Disclosure | As recorded |
|---|---|
| CFU as printed | Probiotic blend (80 billion CFU) 200 mg |
| What that count is measured against | Through expiry |
| Strain designators | All organisms coded |
| Organism slots transcribed here | 3 — the full panel |
| Marketed as | Unisex |
"Bio-K+ Extra Care delivers 80 billion CFU per capsule, guaranteed until the expiration date when refrigerated — not at the time of manufacture. This distinction matters because bacterial counts in probiotics decline over time; a guaranteed-at-expiry figure gives a more accurate picture of what reaches your system."
The panel’s own words on potency, verbatim.
The panel guarantees the count through the expiration or best-by date. This is the only basis that is falsifiable by a reader holding the bottle.
Every organism on the panel carries a printed strain designator. Whether those designators lead anywhere is a separate question, answered below.
| Organism as printed | Designator as printed | Quantity as printed | What the designator resolves to | The query we ran |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lacticaseibacillus casei | LBC80R® | — not stated separately | Human RCT | "LBC80R" → 24; ("CL1285" OR "LBC80R" OR "CLR2") AND randomized controlled trial[pt] → 5 |
| Lacticaseibacillus rhamnosus | CLR2® | — not stated separately | Human RCT | "CLR2" AND Lactobacillus → 16; "Lacticaseibacillus rhamnosus CLR2" → 1 |
| Lactobacillus acidophilus | CL1285® | — not stated separately | Human RCT | "CL1285" → 29; CL1285 AND probiotic → 28; "CL1285" AND randomized controlled trial[pt] → 5; "CL1285" AND clinical trial[pt] → 6 |
What of that is verifiable
A disclosure is verifiable when a reader can open a record that neither we nor the brand controls and see the same thing. Below is every dated artefact this page rests on. What is absent from this list is not verified, however reasonable it sounds.
- Photograph of the printed panel — 373c430c031c--Bio-K-Extra-Care-80-facts.pnghttps://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0455/1183/5798/t/7/assets/373c430c031c--Bio-K-Extra-Care-80-facts.png — Address given, not linked: this site does not link out to the products it audits. captured The brand's own Supplement Facts image, downloaded from its CDN and transcribed verbatim: serving size 1 capsule, 30 servings per container, "Probiotic blend (80 billion CFU) 200 mg †" over the three strains, "† Daily Value not established." The panel is image-only, though this page is the exception in its batch that does put the strain trio into HTML text.
- NIH Dietary Supplement Label Database record — DSLD 64493 (opens in a new tab) captured No DSLD record exists for the 80B SKU. Three sibling records do, all under the brand name "Bio-K Plus", all entered 2016-09-22 and all on-market: 64489 (UPC 6 26608 00112 8, 12.5 B, 220 mg), 64492 (UPC 6 26608 00125 8, 25 B, 375 mg) and 64493 (UPC 6 26608 00150 0, 50 B, 375 mg). The UPC company-prefix cross-check passes — the live GTIN 626608001708 shares the GS1 prefix 626608 with all three, so the labeller is the same — and all three records name the identical trio, so the formula is stable across a decade. Cited for labeller identity, formula continuity and the older storage wording. Never cited for this SKU's own numbers.
How many of its strains have a human trial for what it is sold for
Across the frozen founding cohort, 0 of 294 organism slots (0.0%) carry an organism with a human randomised controlled trial for any male-specific outcome. Not for this product — for all 27 of the founding teardowns, taken together. That is the number to hold against any men’s probiotic, including this one.
Two further founding-cohort figures for context: only 43 of 294 organism slots carry a strain with any human RCT at all under the exact code printed on the label, and only 2 of 27 products have a published human trial of the finished formula — the thing actually in the bottle. All three figures divide by the frozen cohort of 27 teardowns and 294 organism slots, never by every teardown on this site.
For this product specifically, 3 organism slots carry a strain with a human RCT under the exact designator printed on the label.
A word on what a designator has to clear before it counts here. The organism must be named with the exact strain code that appears in the trial, the trial must be in humans, and the code must return that trial when a reader searches it. A species name does not qualify: the trials in this field are of strains, and a species contains thousands of them.
What it costs per day
What certification it holds, checked at the issuer’s own register
A badge on a bottle is a claim like any other. Every row below was checked — or not checked — at the certifier’s own public register, never at the badge. Across the frozen founding cohort, 2 of 27 products hold a certification we could confirm at the issuer — a founding-cohort figure, not a count over every teardown on this site.
| Programme | Status at the issuer | Checked |
|---|---|---|
| Non-GMO Project | Register unreachable | 31 July 2026 |
| GFCO (Gluten-Free Certification Organization) | Absent from register | 31 July 2026 |
Non-GMO Project
The certifier’s register could not be queried at all. That is a finding about the verification infrastructure, not about the brand.
The site FAQ claims, verbatim, that "The following products are verified and certified by the third party 'NON-GMO Project'" and that "More rencently, all the Bio-K+ capsules have been certified non-GMO." [sic]. The issuer's public product register could not be queried: nongmoproject.org returns 200 but every product-directory path tested — /find-by-product/, /products/, /verified-products/, /find-verified-products/ — returns 404, and /find-non-gmo/ renders a shell with no reachable product-search endpoint. Brand-asserted, unverified. Never "verified"; never "does not hold it".
GFCO (Gluten-Free Certification Organization)
The register was queried and this product is not listed on it.
Six queries — brand field Bio-K, Bio-K+, Bio-K Plus and keyword field Bio-K, Biok — all returned "No products found", with the control query "probiotic" returning 25 certified products, which proves the register and the query are functioning. Read this zero carefully: GFCO is one gluten-free certifier among several (NSF, the Allergen Control Group's GFCP — the dominant Canadian scheme for a Quebec-manufactured product — and Coeliac UK's Crossed Grain), so absence from GFCO does not establish that Bio-K+ lacks gluten-free certification. What it establishes is narrower and still worth publishing: the brand names no issuer, so the only publicly queryable register cannot corroborate the claim, and the consumer has no route to check it either.
How it differs from the same brand’s women’s version
Across the fourteen same-brand men’s-versus-women’s label diffs run inside the frozen founding cohort, zero men’s or default formulas contain a probiotic strain, identified by designator, that was selected on male-specific evidence. In eight of the fourteen the sex-specific differentiator is a botanical or a mineral, and in five of the fourteen the women’s SKU is better-specified, cheaper, or both — “better-specified” meaning the panel that discloses more, never the panel with more in it. The rule behind each of those counts, and all fourteen pairs classified against it , are published in full. Diffs run on teardowns added since sit outside this fourteen, and outside the sentence above.
Compared against Bio-K+ Women's Health Probiotic Capsules. Diffed .
What the two panels differ by
- The women's SKU exists as a named, categorised, merchandised gendered product. This one does not: its gender exists only in FAQ text, and the brand's own product search returns "0 result" for "men", "mens" and "male". biokplus.com/search?q=men&type=product → "No results found for 'men'", against q=women → "1 result"; /products.json full catalogue, 33 products, 0 men's, 2 Women's Health, all read 2026-07-31
- The women's SKU changes the organisms entirely — L. rhamnosus GR-1™ and L. reuteri RC-14™, which the brand itself calls "the world's most documented urogenital strains" — and makes an anatomically matched claim, "promote a healthy vaginal balance and help support urinary tract microbiota". This SKU keeps the AAD/CDAD trio unchanged and claims generic "digestive and immune health". biokplus.com Women's Health Probiotic Capsules page (SKUs 626608019017 / 626608019024, $23.69 CAD / 6 pack) versus this page (SKU 626608001708, $49.99 CAD / 30 caps), both read 2026-07-31
- The one organism in the brand's entire range with a testosterone literature behind it — L. reuteri — is in the women's product and absent from everything marketed to men. That literature is itself animal: Poutahidis T et al., PLoS One 2014, in mice. biokplus.com catalogue, 2026-07-31; PMID 24392159 [ANIMAL]
What is identical across the pair
- Both are Bio-K+ capsules sold from the same US-locale storefront with CAD pricing and no functioning cart.
Every finding on this page, with the record behind it
Finding 1 the-clinically-studied-claim-rests-on-a-different-formula-at-a-different-dose
The pivotal trial — Gao XW et al., Am J Gastroenterol 2010;105(7):1636-41, PMID 20145608, NCT00958308, n=255 hospitalised adults on antibiotics — used TWO of these three strains, CL1285 + LBC80R, with CLR2 not in it, at 50 or 100 billion CFU a day, for AAD and CDAD prophylaxis in inpatients. This product sells three strains at 80 billion a day for "digestive and immune health" in healthy adults. It matches neither arm: it sits between a dose the trial found inferior and a dose the trial found superior. That is a claim failing on strain composition, dose, population and outcome simultaneously.
The record: PMID 20145608, agent and conclusion quoted verbatim; CLR2 confirmed as a later addition by the brand's own paper PMID 36898672
Finding 2 the-null-trial-of-the-actual-formula-appears-nowhere-in-the-marketing
Leal J et al., Infect Control Hosp Epidemiol 2024;45(4):443-451, PMID 38073551 — the exact marketed three-strain formula at 100 billion CFU/day, four acute-care hospitals, patients aged 55 and over — reported "no change in HA-CDI (incidence rate ratio [IRR], 0.92; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.68–1.23) or C. difficile positivity rate (IRR, 1.05; 95% CI, 0.89–1.24)". Both intervals cross 1. Report the authors' own limitations fairly — low baseline HA-CDI incidence, adherence 66.7–75.8% at 72 hours, possible incomplete courses on discharge — and the headline still stands. No Bio-K+ marketing surface examined in this pass mentions it, and the paper's COI statement records that a co-author took travel support from the Bio-K+ International Advisory Board to present the study data.
The record: PMID 38073551 (PMCID PMC11007362), agent, result and COI statement quoted verbatim, 2026-07-31
Finding 3 the-immune-claim-has-zero-strain-level-evidence
The product's headline benefit is repeated as "Ultimate immune support", "Support Immune Health*", "comprehensive gut and immune support†" and "promotes digestive and immune health". Against PubMed: "CL1285" AND (immune OR immunity OR immunological) → 0; CL1285 AND (immune OR immunity) → 0; "CL1285" AND immun* → 2, and both are the null CDI trial and its companion implementation paper, matching on the word "Immunology" in an author's departmental affiliation rather than on any immune outcome. There is no immune-outcome study of these strains in PubMed. The control query CL1285 AND probiotic returns 28, so the zero is a real absence rather than a tokenisation artefact.
The record: PubMed E-utilities, three query formulations plus a positive control, run 2026-07-31
Finding 4 the-cfu-guarantee-condition-is-stated-four-inconsistent-ways
Three of the four are on this page: the "How to Use" block says the count is guaranteed "when refrigerated", the product FAQ says the same, and a site FAQ block embedded on the same page says the capsules "do not require refrigeration". The standalone FAQ page resolves it in the opposite direction again, stating that capsules are guaranteed "if the product is refrigerated" but that "New capsules launched recently (Specialized wellness: ABS*, Women's Health*, Extra capsules) are shelf stable". This SKU is badged "Specialized Wellness" and is an "Extra" capsule, so by the FAQ's own taxonomy it is shelf-stable and by its own How-to-Use text it must be refrigerated. A consumer who stores it in a cupboard has, depending which sentence they read, either a product performing exactly as guaranteed or a product whose 80-billion claim the brand has disclaimed.
The record: biokplus.com Extra Care 80B page (three blocks) and biokplus.com/pages/faq, all read verbatim 2026-07-31
Finding 5 the-older-labels-were-more-informative-than-the-current-website
DSLD 64493, verbatim: "Bacterial count of 50 billion CFU per capsule guaranteed until expiry date when refrigerated and 90 days at room temperature." That 90-day room-temperature carve-out is genuinely informative and it has disappeared from the current marketing, replaced by four mutually inconsistent sentences.
The record: DSLD 64493 against the current product page and FAQ, all read 2026-07-31 — open it (opens in a new tab)
Finding 6 per-strain-cfu-not-disclosed
200 mg and 80 billion CFU are declared for the trio combined with no split, so you know exactly which strains you are buying and not how much of each. Acute here because the pivotal trial tested only two of the three.
The record: Panel 373c430c031c--Bio-K-Extra-Care-80-facts.png, transcribed 2026-07-31
Finding 7 milligrams-of-blend-tell-you-nothing-about-cfu
From the brand's own label history: this SKU is 200 mg for 80 billion (2.5 mg per billion), DSLD 64489 is 220 mg for 12.5 billion (17.6), DSLD 64492 is 375 mg for 25 billion (15.0), DSLD 64493 is 375 mg for 50 billion (7.5). Note the last two — identical blend mass, double the CFU. The relationship swings sevenfold inside one brand's own labels, so any comparison ranking probiotics by milligrams is ranking carrier rather than bacteria. The 80B's 2.5 mg per billion is consistent with a higher-potency freeze-dried culture and a different carrier load; it is also the kind of jump a certificate of analysis should substantiate, and none is offered.
The record: Brand panel image against DSLD 64489, 64492 and 64493, all read 2026-07-31
Finding 8 mens-positioning-is-faq-only-on-a-brand-with-no-mens-sku
A full FAQ heading on this page asks "Are Bio-K+ Extra Care probiotic pills for men worth choosing over lower-potency options?" and answers by saying "for men" twice and then describing the identical gender-neutral product. The page's own audience statement is "designed for adults seeking intensive daily probiotic support" and "Ideal for anyone seeking intensive probiotic care". The brand's own product search returns "No results found for 'men'" (and 0 for "mens" and "male") against "1 result" for "women", and its full products.json catalogue holds 33 products, zero men's and two Women's Health SKUs.
The record: biokplus.com FAQ text; biokplus.com/search?q=<term>&type=product for men, mens, male and women; /products.json full catalogue enumeration, all 2026-07-31
Finding 9 zero-male-outcome-evidence-for-any-of-the-three-strains
Three independent query formulations, three zeros: CL1285 AND (testosterone OR prostate OR "male fertility" OR sperm) → 0; ("CL1285" OR "LBC80R" OR "CLR2") AND (testosterone OR prostate OR androgen OR spermatogenesis OR "erectile" OR "male infertility") → 0; "Lactobacillus acidophilus CL1285" AND men → 0. No study of any kind — RCT, observational, animal or in vitro — links these strains to any male-specific outcome.
The record: PubMed E-utilities, three formulations, run 2026-07-31
Finding 10 sixteen-published-clinical-trials-not-reproducible-from-the-literature
"More than 30 years of research and 16 published clinical trials" is repeated across the page. PubMed returns 6 by clinical-trial publication type for "CL1285" and 5 by RCT publication type across all three designators. The 16 is not called false — it may include trials indexed without strain codes, unindexed journals or company-held studies — but it is not reproducible from the public literature on the designators, and no bibliography is offered on the product page to reconcile it.
The record: PubMed "CL1285" AND clinical trial[pt] → 6; ("CL1285" OR "LBC80R" OR "CLR2") AND randomized controlled trial[pt] → 5, run 2026-07-31
Finding 11 the-review-carousel-is-not-about-this-product
Testimonials displayed under "Loved by Thousands of Happy Bio-K+! Customers" on this page include "The ashwagandha also helps me cope with stressful weeks", "I like that it has ashwagandha to help me sleep", "The Bio-K+ Probiotic Supplement includes 20 capsules…", "With something like 25 billion CFU strains, I had to try this" and "there are 20 capsules in the bottle". This product contains no ashwagandha, has 30 capsules and is 80 billion CFU. The identical carousel appears verbatim on the drinkable page — a product that is not a capsule at all — where reviewers praise capsules that are "easy to swallow". The social proof is pooled across the catalogue and presented as product-specific.
The record: biokplus.com Extra Care 80B and drinkable pages, testimonial blocks read verbatim 2026-07-31
Finding 12 the-us-storefront-is-not-a-storefront
Served from the US locale (region selector "USA, EN", Instagram handle @biokplususa), every price on the page is in CAD including the cart subtotal, the product's own structured data declares it OutOfStock, and there is no add-to-cart — only "Find in Store". The brand's own products.json shows every variant across all 33 catalogue products as available: false. A US shopper cannot buy this product from the brand and cannot learn what it costs in their own currency from the brand at all.
The record: biokplus.com schema.org Offer node, cart footer and /products.json, all read 2026-07-31
Finding 13 strain-codes-are-house-designations-not-public-deposits
CL1285, LBC80R and CLR2 are Bio-K Plus International's internal designations rather than ATCC, DSM, CNCM, NCIMB or CECT accessions, so no independent lab can obtain the reference strain from a public collection. A footnote to the credit rather than a red flag on its own — the codes are used consistently across roughly 29 indexed papers, which is what a designator is for — but it is a weaker form of traceability than a published deposit.
The record: Panel 373c430c031c--Bio-K-Extra-Care-80-facts.png and the PubMed record set, 2026-07-31
Finding 14 a-disease-claim-sits-one-click-away-in-the-same-catalogue
Every claim on THIS product page is structure/function-worded with the disclaimer correctly placed, including inside the FAQ answers, and it passes cleanly. Flagged for brand-level context only: the sibling IBS Support SKU carries, in its own products.json description, "Formulated to help improve symptoms associated with irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) with predominance of diarrhea… Bio-K+ IBS Pro has been scientifically studied to help normalize stool consistency and frequency" — naming a diagnosed disorder and claiming symptom improvement, which is the classic structure of a disease claim under 21 CFR 101.93(g).
The record: biokplus.com /products.json description for probiotic-capsules-ibs-control, read verbatim 2026-07-31
What we could not verify
Every gap below is published rather than deleted. Most are derived automatically from the empty fields in this page’s own record, so a gap cannot be hidden by leaving a box blank.
- Non-GMO Project status
- The site FAQ claims, verbatim, that "The following products are verified and certified by the third party 'NON-GMO Project'" and that "More rencently, all the Bio-K+ capsules have been certified non-GMO." [sic]. The issuer's public product register could not be queried: nongmoproject.org returns 200 but every product-directory path tested — /find-by-product/, /products/, /verified-products/, /find-verified-products/ — returns 404, and /find-non-gmo/ renders a shell with no reachable product-search endpoint. Brand-asserted, unverified. Never "verified"; never "does not hold it".
- A US retail price, and therefore the cost per day
- No USD price is published by the brand. The product's own Offer node prices it at $49.99 CAD with priceCurrency "CAD" — $1.67 CAD a day at the panel's own one-capsule serving — on a US-locale storefront (region selector "USA, EN") whose cart subtotal also reads $0.00 CAD. The product's own structured data declares it OutOfStock and there is no add-to-cart, only "Find in Store". This is systemic rather than a one-off outage: the brand's own products.json shows every variant across all 33 catalogue products with available: false. No US retail figure was substituted from a third party.
- Any USD retail price, and therefore a comparable cost per day
- The brand publishes CAD only, on a US-locale storefront, for a product its own structured data marks OutOfStock and for which there is no add-to-cart. Cost-per-day comparison against the rest of this project is possible only by converting a foreign-currency price for an item the brand says it has no stock of.
- The per-strain CFU split across the three organisms
- The panel declares 200 mg and 80 billion CFU for the trio combined and discloses no split, so any one of the three could be present at a token dose. This matters more than usual here because the pivotal efficacy trial tested only two of the three.
- A public culture-collection deposit for any of the three strains
- CL1285, LBC80R and CLR2 are Bio-K Plus International's own internal designations, not ATCC, DSM, CNCM, NCIMB or CECT accessions. No deposit number appears on this label, so an independent lab cannot obtain the reference strain from a public collection to verify identity.
- Non-GMO Project verification, claimed in the site FAQ
- The issuer's product directory could not be queried — every path tested returns 404 and the search page renders with no reachable product endpoint — so the claim is brand-asserted and unverified rather than false.
- The brand's own list of "16 published clinical trials"
- The list was not enumerated and no bibliography is published on the product page. Only what PubMed returns for the strain designators is reported: 6 by clinical-trial publication type, 5 by RCT publication type. The gap is unreconciled, not a falsehood.
- Funding source and conflicts of interest for the older CL1285 trials
- Not retrievable from abstracts alone. Gao 2010's authorship includes industry-affiliated authors (Reifer, Miller); full text was not pulled, so no funding characterisation is published.
- Any third-party attestation of the 80-billion CFU number
- There is no NSF contents certification, no USP verification, no Informed Choice or BSCG mark and no published certificate of analysis. For a product whose entire premium rests on a viability number, no third party attests to it — and none of Non-GMO Project verification, gluten-free certification or "Vegan" says anything about CFU count at expiry, strain identity, potency or contaminant screening.
How to check every line of this page yourself
Nothing on this page requires trusting us. Every claim above resolves to a record you can open:
- Open the NIH Dietary Supplement Label Database record linked at the top of this page. It is the label the manufacturer filed, not our transcription of it.
- Compare the CFU line and the suggested-use line against the disclosure table above. If they disagree with us, we are wrong and we want to know.
- Take any strain designator from the panel and run the query printed beside it. The query is published precisely so you can get a different answer than we did.
- Divide the price by the number of days the label’s own dose instructions make the container last. That arithmetic is the whole of the cost-per-day row.
- Search the certifier’s own register for this product, not for the brand. A company can participate in a programme without this product being on its list.
This is one of the best-disclosed labels in the whole project, and that is precisely what makes it useful. Strain transparency and marketing honesty turn out to be independent variables.
Credit first, and it is substantial. All three organisms carry unique published designators. The nomenclature is current — post-2020 Lacticaseibacillus for casei and rhamnosus — so the label has been revisited since the reclassification. And the CFU basis is not merely at expiry, it is explained: “80 billion CFU per capsule, guaranteed until the expiration date when refrigerated — not at the time of manufacture. This distinction matters because bacterial counts in probiotics decline over time.” That is a potency basis the label explains rather than merely states — the brand says why the distinction matters instead of leaving a reader to work it out. This file does not rank it against the other 165, because “best disclosure” is a judgement with no countable predicate behind it.
Then read the storage instructions. The same page tells you the guarantee holds when refrigerated (twice) and that the capsules do not require refrigeration (once), and the standalone FAQ page adds a fourth answer in which “Extra” capsules are shelf-stable. This SKU is badged “Specialized Wellness” and is an “Extra” capsule. The one number a buyer is paying a premium for is conditioned on a storage instruction the brand cannot state consistently — and the brand’s own 2016 labels were more precise than its 2026 website, carrying a “90 days at room temperature” carve-out that has simply disappeared.
“Clinically studied” fails here on four axes at once. The pivotal trial used two of these three strains at 50 or 100 billion a day, for antibiotic-associated and C. difficile diarrhoea in hospitalised inpatients. This product is three strains at 80 billion a day, sold for digestive and immune health to healthy adults — matching neither arm, sitting between the dose that trial called inferior and the one it called superior. Meanwhile the largest and most recent randomised trial of the actual marketed formula reported no effect (IRR 0.92, 95% CI 0.68–1.23), and it appears in none of the brand’s materials even though a co-author presented the data to the brand’s own advisory board. And the headline immune claim has zero strain-level records across three query formulations, with a positive control proving the query mechanics work.
The men’s layer is one FAQ heading. “Are Bio-K+ Extra Care probiotic pills for men worth choosing over lower-potency options?” — the answer says “for men” twice and then describes the identical gender-neutral product. Ask the brand’s own search engine for “men” and it replies “No results found.” Ask it for “women” and it returns a real SKU. That SKU is the whole argument: when Bio-K+ wants to make a sex-specific product, it changes the strains — GR-1 and RC-14, two designators with a genuine urogenital literature — and makes an anatomically matched claim. For men it changed nothing and wrote a heading.
Finally, the storefront. Every price on this US page is in Canadian dollars, the product’s own structured data says OutOfStock, there is no add-to-cart, and all 33 products in the catalogue are unavailable. You cannot buy it, and you cannot find out what it costs in your own currency.