Buzz
The bacteria and other microbes living in the vagina are critical to our health, but much like the microbes elsewhere in our bodies, they are still not fully understood. A company is now offering free vaginal microbiome reports for women who participate in their study.
This company, Juno Bio, is a startup focused on researching the vaginal microbiome. While their website doesn’t specify the exact questions the study intends to explore, they highlight bacterial vaginosis and infertility as issues worth investigating. Their approach seems to involve using machine learning to decode the microbiome, a highly intricate and variable system that changes from person to person and even day to day.
Currently, knowing what’s present in your microbiome (whether vaginal or not) won’t provide actionable insights into your health. Several years ago, during my pregnancy, I participated in a similar study. I sent in my samples and eagerly awaited the email, only to open it and find a list of bacterial taxa. Interesting? Sure, in a 'wow, science!' kind of way (I’m a nerd), but we simply don’t have enough understanding of the microbiome to turn that data into something useful for individual health.
Juno stresses that their test is not intended to diagnose any health conditions. Simply put, you won't be informed if you have any health problems. (In fact, the study is more likely to ask you about your health: it involves completing a questionnaire.) The company clarified in a Reddit post that they keep participants’ personal data confidential, and that after sending your results, the data is disconnected from your identity.
If you're interested in learning more about your microbiome and are willing to share some of your data points without knowing the exact outcomes, you can sign up here. They are recruiting women who are at least 19 years old and live within the continental US. (The company stated on Reddit that 'we could improve some of the language around eligibility to be more inclusive of our trans and non-binary friends,' but the form still has a mandatory checkbox that reads 'I am a woman.')
Updated 11/13/2019 at 4:54pm to clarify that Juno lists identifying as a 'woman' as one of their eligibility criteria.
