I had near perfect skin all throughout my teenage years, proclaiming boastfully to my blemish covered peers that “I dunno, I just skipped that phase.”

I did not skip that phase. It just came later in life. Ugh.

COVID related stress, mask wearing and the general travails of being a real adult brought about that smattering of acne I thought I was safe from. Despite not having a bad case of acne, I understand the mental toll it can take on someone. Like it or not, we live in a society where a whole lot is tied to our appearance so it comes as no surprise that we see acne as something to ‘get rid of’.

And ‘get rid of’ we do… except maybe we get rid of our money more than pimples. Acne affects approximately 80% of adolescents and young adults aged between 11 and 30 at some point. The global market for acne treatments was valued at USD $6 billion as of 2019 and is expected to climb to USD $7.6 billion in 2026.

Microbiome health company Biome Australia (ASX: BIO) has been investigating their probiotic’s effects on acne in a clinical trial.

Carried out in Italy, the trial results have now been published in the peer-reviewed journal of Dermatology and Therapy.

The trial was run using a double-blind, placebo-controlled model to evaluate the performance of various probiotic strains on 55 patients suffering mild to moderate acne. Interestingly, the participants treated with the probiotic strains had a marked reduction in their acne of 31.11% in four weeks. The trial ran for 8 weeks, at which point reduction in acne lesions had continued to decrease (by a total of 38.89%), as well as a reduction in skin redness and presence of bacteria on the skin.

Following the positive trial results, Biome will launch their Acne Probiotic in Q4 FY22 as the world’s first clinically proven probiotic for the management of acne. The launch will see the product stocked in over 2,300 community pharmacies and independent health providers across Australia. The product will also hit shelves in the UK and New Zealand under the name Biome Derma.

Given the sizeable market and the commercial opportunity for clinically validated products, Biome Australia has a real opportunity to carve out a name for themselves as leaders in the space, potentially pushing their market cap up from the $19 million where it currently stands with investors looking to get in on the ground floor.

For the quarter ending 31st December 2021, Biome had over $7.7 million in the bank thanks to their successful IPO in November.