Body pH: Acid Alkaline Balance Review

 

Does Maintaining Acid Alkaline Balance Benefit Your Health?

by James Khan

Acid alkaline balanced food combining history

“If one does not know that the nature of substances may be opposed to each other, and one consumes them altogether indiscriminately, the vital organs will be thrown out of harmony and disastrous consequences will soon arise.

Chia Ming, Essential Knowledge for Eating and Drinking, 1368 AD, Source Daniel Reid, The Tao of Health, Sex and Longevity

 

In 1908 Dr Howard Hay after practicing medicine for 16 years developed high blood pressure, bright’s disease and a dilated heart. There was no treatment available for bright’s disease and dilated heart so Dr Hay decided to find a cure for his own symptoms. He focused on his food intake and the chemical process of digestion and the enzymes that are essential for this process.

To the amazement of his colleagues, he had a complete remission of his symptoms in 3 months of changing his diet.

He also reduced his weight by 20 Kg.

In 1911 Dr Hay introduced his Food Combining guidelines, which are also known as the Hay Diet. This diet is based on the fact that digestive enzymes are very highly pH specific, and so for best digestion it is better to have either an alkaline or acidic environment for them to work in.

His simple message was: eat whatever wholesome, nutritious food you like; just don’t eat complex proteins and carbohydrates/sugars/fruits in the same meal because this will allow the digestive enzymes to work better. He advised on a reduced consumption of acid forming foods.

Although Dr Hay had many critics, he continued to lecture till his death. Today millions of people world wide are following or further extending his basic principles to include other food types and such factors as individual and genetic metabolic differences.

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What do clinical studies suggest?

We know that enzymes are essential for digestion and that enzymes only function at specific pH levels. Common sense tells you that you should provide your body with the required nutrients in the right combinations that it needs to digest the food and perform its functions, including the all important maintenance of an alkaline blood pH level of 7.365.

Yet, some scientists, chemists adoctors maintain that this is Quackery.

The body needs no help from a dietary acid-alkaline angle with regards to digestion or to maintain an alkaline blood pH, they argue.

They also argue that all food in the stomach is acidic and becomes alkaline in the duodenum and that the body has an effective buffering system based on bicarbonates and an acid/alkaline diet or alkaline water has no effect on this.

So, you can eat or drink what you like, in whatever combination and the body will have no problems, they argue.

Others like Daniel Reid disagree, and believe that the pH of the liquids consumed has a significant effect on health and well being.

He explains, for example, that the sugary sweet, fizzy ‘soft drink’ is actually an ‘acid bomb’.

A 350 ml serving of Coke, Pepsi or similar drink delivers a sugar fix equivalent to about 9 teaspoons of sugar straight into the blood stream. This instantly acidifies the bloodstream to the extreme point that without an immediate emergency response from the body, it would kill you in a mater of minutes.

To counter act this rise in pH, you’d have to drink 32 glasses of alkaline water to neutralize the blood pH. In order to prevent death by acidosis, the body reacts swiftly by drawing huge amounts of organic calcium from the bones and teeth and pouring it into the bloodstream to neutralize the excess acid and quickly restore alkaline balance. Calcium is the bodies most potent alkalizing agent, and this defensive response mechanism is one of the main causes of osteoporosis.”

 

Who is right?

Are there any scientific studies to settle this issue?

Lets look at a few.

1. Pavlov’s experiments

Probably the first scientific studies on digestion were conducted by Ivan Pavlov who became famous for his experiments on ‘salivating dogs’. Pavlov’s experiments with rats showed that that starches are digested in about two hours, proteins are digested in about four hours but a protein-starch mixture can still be digesting 13 hours later. In other words, a protein-starch mixture takes several times longer to digest, compared to eating then separately.

Pavlov also showed that food taken on top (i.e. before digestion has completed) can lead to fermentation and toxic by-products, putting strain on the system. This happens when you eat fruit after a meal; many people say that it gives them gas.

What could account for this?

In fact, most fruits go straight through the stomach into the duodenum for digestion, which means if you put fresh fruit on top of a big meal, it has to sit and wait in the top of the stomach until the other food is digested, during which delay bacteria attack the fruit and ferment it, gobbling up all the nutrients and leaving you with gas and metabolic wastes.

Daniel Reid, Trophology: The Science of Food Combining.

 

2. Cola consumption

This study of Cola beverage consumption induces bone mineralization reduction in ovariectomized rats” (the rats were fed cola – acid, pH 2.5 – and the effects on bone density measured) suggests that calcium from the bones is used up in maintaining an alkaline blood pH balance.

The researchers concluded:

These data suggest that heavy intake of cola soft drinks has the potential of reducing femoral mineral density“.

 

3. Ionized water on milk yield

This study on the effects of alkaline ionized water on milk yield, body weight of offspring and perinatal dam in ratstentatively concludes that:

higher calcium concentration of AKW [alkaline water] enriched the mother, serum calcium which was transferred to the fetus through the placenta and to the offspring through the milk.”

 

4. Ionized water and electrolyte concentration

This study on the Influences of alkaline ionized water on milk electrolyte concentrations in maternal ratsstates:

These data suggested that the Ca cation of AKW enriched the Ca concentration of the milk and accelerated the postnatal growth of the offspring of rats given AKW

 

5. Decline of alkaline buffer bicarbonates with age

In 1996 Dr. Lynda Frassetto at the University of California, San Francisco, discovered that as we age, starting around age 45, we lose the alkaline buffer bicarbonates in our blood.  By the age of 90, we lose 18% of bicarbonates in our blood. This loss was shown to be diet induced. This is from the published abstract

Our group has shown that contemporary net acid-producing diets do indeed characteristically produce a low-grade systemic metabolic acidosis in otherwise healthy adult subjects, and that the degree of acidosis increases with age, in relation to the normally occurring age-related decline in renal functional capacity.

  • Figure 2, graph B of
  • Journal of Gerontology: BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES, 1996, Vol. 51A. No. 1, B91-B99
  • By Dr. Lynda Frassetto of University of California, San Francisco (Dotted line added by Sang Whang)

 

Sang Whang had been saying the same. This study in part supports his Theory of Aging: we age because we accumulate organic acid wastes.

Insufficient amount of bicarbonates in our blood reduces our capabilities to manage (neutralize and dump) the acid our body produces from metabolism. The bicarbonates get used up after years of continual efforts to maintain an alkaline balance because of the acidifying diet that we now have.

The age of 45 is the average age when we start to show symptoms of diabetes, hypertension, osteoporosis and many other adult degenerative diseases.Dr Frassetto suggests that since are now subjected to so much acid wastes, it is as if we have made a evolutionary change: we are now depositing them in pockets of fat away from the major organs where they can do less damage.These wastes show up as cholesterol, fatty acid, uric acid, urate, sulfate, phosphate, kidney stones, etc.

 

Conclusion of scientific studies

These and other studies suggest that:

If you eat proteins and carbs in the same meal, they won’t digest quickly.

If you drink acid drinks (like cola), the body will take calcium from the bones and teeth to maintain pH balance

If you drink alkaline water this will be assimilated by your body – i.e. gradually improve your bones and teeth

If you eat acid producing foods, over the long run it will deplete your alkaline buffers and is a cause of acidosis.

Over-acidity could be the cause of obesity; alkalinity and hydration could be the simple cure.

 

So a water rich alkaline diet and alkaline water could help you lose weight and improve your general health.

Remember, often what you don’t eat is more important then what you do eat. You should in particular avoid sugary, acidic soft drinks that give you concentrated acid water to harm your blood pH and blood sugar levels.

Also keep in mind as the Frassetto study showed, we are now stockpiling acid wastes in our bodies in pockets of fat. The body creates fat to cope with the heavy load of toxic acid wastes that are continuously being produced as a result of metabolism. The fat consists of cholesterol, cellulose and other deposits which actually contain dangerous organic wastes inside them.

The basic problem is that we eat too much of the wrong things. As Dr Young says, “obesity is an acid problem – the fat is saving our lives

The answer is simple: lots of alkaline water; more alkaline, water rich foods and; don’t eat foods the fight in the same meal.

This page is about a natural detox diet.

The next section addresses some specific alkaline diet and alkaline water questions.

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Alkaline water and alkaline diet questions

Q1: Why do most ND’s and nutritionists advice clients to eat a predominantly alkaline diet?

Maybe they have studied nutrition from the acid-alkaline and digestive enzyme aspects, or they are vegetarian for ethical reasons.

I select food according to its nutritious content, rather then whether it is ‘acid’ or ‘alkaline’ on a food chart. I combine food in a meal according to how it will best be digested.

So, for example, I won’t eat fruit after a meal or eat steak and chips – I’ll eat the fruit first, and swap the chips for a fresh salad! I don’t take the food combining rules too rigidly, as I know that the body is intelligent and can handle quite diverse food combinations. But the food combination in a meal of a Big Mac, Fries and Coke is a definite no!

Super Size showed a young man go from a state of good health to near death in under a month simply from eating processed fast food. Morgan Spurlock put on 25 pounds, got depressed, suffered chronic chest pains and palpitations, his libido was low, sex life non-functional, he stank, experienced mood swings, liver damage; his medical charts went off the scales. He also suffered from addiction, lack of energy and fuzzy logic. These things are now typical of modern life.

From a standard ‘scientific’ or chemistry point of view, his diet contained lots of protein (for muscle), fat and carbohydrate and sugary drinks for energy, so he should have been fine.

So why did he nearly die?

Q2: What is the connection between acidity and obesity?

We are now stockpiling acid wastes in our bodies in pockets of fat. The body creates fat to cope with the heavy load of toxic acid wastes that are continuously being produced as a result of metabolism. The fat consists of cholesterol, cellulose and other deposits which actually contain dangerous organic wastes inside them.

Remember: ” Obesity is an acid problem – the fat is saving our lives“]

 

Q3: What is the connection between dehydration and obesity?

It has also been shown (I’m afraid I don’t have clinical studies to hand) that the body also creates cholesterol as a water conservation mechanism – it surrounds the cell walls to stop water leaving the cell. This also stops nutrients from entering in and toxins from leaving the cell, but it means that you will live. Eventually, such cells with access toxicity become cancerous]

 

Q4: Should I eat alkaline foods and avoid acid foods?

No, I don’t think you should focus too much on this.

Solod foods are classified as acid or alkaline depending on the pH of the ash (in solution) that is produced on burning them. However, all food is composed of of simple elements like Carbon, Oxygen, hydrogen which burn to produce acid wastes. As over 97% of any food that you eat will create acid wastes; I don’t think that the pH of the ash of the 3% will make much difference!

Alkaline minerals (which make the food acid or alkaline) are only a very small part of the nutrition from solid food. So you shouldn’t focus on this at the expense of other vital nutritional elements that only nature knows about and only nature can provide. It’s silly to avoid any food just because an acid-alkaline chart says that it’s low on certain minerals!

You should, however, drink lots of alkaline water to hydrate, detoxify and mineralize the body. You can always take a balanced colloidal alkaline mineral supplement like Alkalife to supply any minerals not present in diet or water like Potassium, which so many of us are now deficient in.]

 

Q5: If I eat alkaline food, will it make me alkaline?

No, I don’t think that it will and it wouldn’t necessarily be a good thing if it did.

The simple classification of solid food according to the mineral content of its ash is not particularly relevant to nutrition and health.

The important thing is what the food contains, how easy to it is to digest and how much toxic waste it produces on metabolism. The tiny amount of alkaline minerals in even the ‘top’ alkaline food will make very little difference to your alkaline blood buffers in the short term. Over the long term, as the Frassetto study implied, an alkaline diet could help reduce acidosis and obesity, since an ‘acid’ diet causes it.

Drinking ionized alkaline water, fresh vegetable juices and fruit juices and super greens (spirulina, wheat and barley grass juices) on the other hand will help; not only will you get more alkaline minerals, you’ll get the countless number of other nutrients and enzymes that your body needs. Remember, a half tea spoon of something like Barley Grass or Spirulina powder will give you the equivalent alkaline minerals and nutrients as a basket of green vegetables.

Similarly, don’t drink acid soft drinks as discussed above – the concentrated sugar and high acid pH of these drinks plays havoc on your body, and make you fat.

 

Q6: If I have indigestion, isn’t it cheaper and more effective to take ant-acids (baking soda) then mild alkaline water?

Ant-acids are a billion dollar business, but a total waste of money and actually harmful as they reduce our ability to digest protein foods.

Eat food in correct combinations, don’t eat so much, and drink plenty of ionized alkaline water.

Next time you want to snack between meals, snack on a glass of alkaline water!

 

Q7: Will alkaline ionized water de-acidify the stomach?

No. You can never de-acidify the stomach simply because the body produces acids on demand. Without the required stomach acids you won’t be able to digest your food so you shouldn’t try to de-acidify it. The body generates acids depending upon the food you eat – it can produce around 3 liters hydrochloric acid/day. If you reduce the amount of proteins you eat, eat less and in better combinations, it will produce less acid.

Alkaline water is much too mild to have any effect on stomach pH. The stomach is thousands of times more acid, 16 drops of lemon juice would neutralize the alkalinity of alkaline water of pH 10.0.

Remember, the alkalinity (colloidal minerals + excess oxygen) of the water is only one of the benefits from ionized water. Other benefits are from the water being reduced (antioxidant), and its smaller cluster sizes (better hydration) ]

 

Q8:Will not the alkaline water you drink get neutralized by the acidity in the stomach?

Partially, yes, particularly if the stomach is digesting food, but the purified water will still be hydrating, provide alkaline minerals and all the other benefits, and zero toxins – you just won’t get the slight alkaline boost for your blood pH that’s all. This is a minor benefit in any case, but you should drink water first thing in the morning and in-between meals, not during or after meals to get the most benefits. When the stomach is empty, the water or freshly squeezed juices will flow straight through, and not be significantly effected by the acid stomach pH.

Studies, however, show that in colloidal form the calcium ion is surrounded by water molecules; it could well be that nature has a sheltering mechanism for transporting alkaline minerals to where they are required in the body.

The actual pH (i.e. the measurable pH, 8-10 usually) is not the major benefit of this ionized water. Akaline is just a label used to describe the water, one of many labels. You could call it natural water, water pure of contaminants, or pure natural water or pure mineral water.

If you analyze natural spring water from the Alps or better still Glacier water, you will find that it has all these properties: alkaline pH, high colloidal alkaline mineral content, low acid mineral content, low ORP (i.e. reduced), low NMR (small clusters).

In health circles ionized alkaline water is also called microwater, light water, micro-clustered water, reduced water, electrolyzed reduced water (ERW), Ionic mineral water and even miracle water in the Japanese 13 part TV documentary.

Appendix A lists abstracts from 100 published papers that give an indication of the diverse uses of ionized water and terminology used. What is important is what is contained in the water (i.e. alkaline minerals, active hydrogen, excess oxygen in the OH- form, micro-clusters, and zero poisons).

When nutritionists and naturopaths talk about an ‘alkaline diet‘ they are not talking about neutralizing the acidity of the stomach acids that are needed to digest our food with chemicals!

Alkaline foods like super greens and carrot juice are not particularly alkaline if you measure the pH with a meter, but they will have an overall slight alkalizing effect when you change your diet to eat more of them. An important point to note is that if you are eating live, alkaline foods like fruits, freshly squeezed juices you should do so on an empty stomach to help the digestion process and get the most benefits (i.e. nutrients, enzymes and energy) from the food.

This is less of an issue with alkaline water, since there is nothing to digest in water.

 

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Q9: What happens to alkaline water in the acid stomach?

When you drink alkaline water, two things are possible, both will be helpful to the alkaline buffers:

1. If your stomach is full, the water could get trapped in the acid stomach environment. The alkalinity would be neutralized by the stomach acid, and the stomach may produce slightly more acid. A pathologist friend of Sang Whang, Dr. Stephen Weiss explains that in the process of producing more stomach acid (hydrochloric acid) as a result of drinking alkaline water or alkaline foods, the body creates sodium bicarbonate (an alkaline buffer) and adds it to the bloodstream.

H2O + CO2 + NaCl = HCl + NaHCO3

Water + carbon dioxide + salt = hydrochloric acid + sodium bi-carbonate

So the net result is an increase in alkaline buffer. This does not happen if you ingest bicarbonates (baking soda) because the body converts these to water, carbon dioxide and sodium salt. The bicarbonates will not reach the bloodstream no matter how much baking soda you consume.

2. If the stomach is empty, it is likely that the water would go straight through the stomach to the intestine, and go to the blood stream to give it an alkaline pH boost, and any excess will replenish the alkaline buffers. As Sang Whang explains

If alkaline water is introduced directly into the bloodstream from the intestine, the acid buffer (carbonic acid, H2CO3) will interact with the alkaline water to bring down the blood pH and the acid buffer will become the alkaline buffer

Ca(OH) 2 + 2(H2CO3) = Ca++(HCO3-)2 + 2(H2O) (calcium bicarbonate buffer in the blood is the net result)

An increase of bicarbonates in the bloodstream will prevent aging and the onset of adult degenerative diseases.”

 

 

Q10: The body has an efficient buffering system which is continually generated as glucose is metabolized; what use is alkaline water or an alkaline diet for buffering?

The body needs minerals such as calcium, magnesium, potassium, sodium and zinc as fuel to sustain the buffering system, not only glucose! The bodies bicarbonates are sodium, potassium, calcium and magnesium bicarbonates; it also makes effective use of hydroxides, primarily calcium hydroxide to maintain alkaline balance. We need to obtain these minerals from dietary sources; alkaline water , vegetable juices and super green juices are good nutritious sources for the many nutrients the body needs, including alkaline minerals.

Alkaline water helps the buffering system as it provides the minerals that the body needs. See the studies above You can make water alkaline by adding alkalife drops, which are potassium and calcium hydroxides in colloidal form in ionized water. The benefits from increasing the potassium hydroxide in the diet was shown by the Frassetto studies. However, this is only one of the many benefits from alkaline ionized water. Other benefits stem from the ionized water being reduced; it has an ORP around -300, and micro-clustered (low NMR) and it’s good tasting water so you’ll be able to drink more and avoid dehydration, which effects some 75% of the population.

Sang Whang, who introduced water ionizers to the west in the late 80’s adds a couple of drops of alkalife to his ionized water.

 

Body pH doesn’t become a meaningless concept just because different parts of the body and cell have different pH values.

Look at the literature. Read Dr Theodore Baroody’s Alkaize or Die. Read books and articles from countless other doctors, authors and naturopaths worldwide that state from personal clinical experience that body pH (i.e. blood and tissue pH) is a vital indicator of health, and the key part it plays in nutrition.

The same is the case for almost all bodily functions. Acid/alkaline balance concepts are based on years of observations of the types of food and the acidifying or alkalizing effect they have on blood pH. It has been confirmed by countless ND’s throughout the world who advise a predominantly alkaline diet of greens, fruits and vegetable juices for health. This is a good summary that explains why restoring proper pH balance is vital for all bodily functions, including Heart, Lungs, Liver and Kidneys

 

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Q11: Why does the body make so many efforts to maintain an alkaline blood pH?

Body pH is the key to virtually all bodily functions, which is why the body takes immediate emergency actions to maintain an alkaline blood pH, even at the cost obesity, loss of calcium and minerals from the bones and organs and other ailments over the long run.

This is confirmed by blood pH measurements, clinical studies.

Our observation of nature shows how nature uses a delicate pH balance to regulate life on earth, including the decomposition of ‘dead’ life forms.

 

Q12: What would happen if blood pH went slightly acidic, say 6.9?

You would be dead long before this happens! Blood pH is very tightly regulated.

 

Q13: Our 75 trillion cells are slightly acidic within and are surrounded by slightly alkaline interstitial fluid around them. Just like fish in the sea. What would happen if the interstitial fluid becomes acidic?

The polarity essential for chemical and energy interchange of the cells would be lost which would effect the very functioning of the cell. This could be another reason acidic people lack energy. Energetically, we are like acid-alkaline batteries; minerals and correct acid-alkaline pH balance for the various body fluids is essential for most cellular functions.

 

Q14: Why is water, which has acid (H+) and alkaline (OH-) ions in it, vital for life?

The ions are able to hold charge, conduct electricity without which there would be no life.

Q14b: Could there be any truth in the 5000 year old Yin and Yang balance theories?

Yes! Modern medicine is barely 100 years old, I seriously wonder if there is a lot of truth in it – time will tell!

 

Q15: Why is the water from high altitude mineral springs alkaline?

Nature uses acid and alkaline ions in water to provide nutrients, hydration and to control growth, death, decay and house cleaning.

 

Q15b: Why would nature go through the trouble of separating alkaline water for drinking, and acid water for skin cleansing as for example in hot mineral baths?

Nature is nature, we learn a little more about it each day. Alkaline water is energized, for drinking. Acid waters are for skin cleansing

 

Q15c: Why is our skin slightly acidic on on the surface and alkaline from the inside?

The acid skin repels bacteria, it maintains a polarity with the alkaline of the pH on the inner skin. This yin and yang are seen throughout the body.

 

Q15d: Why is the pH of sea water and our blood the same – slightly alkaline?

We came from the sea.

Our blood composition is the same pH as the sea in ideal conditions.

Maybe mother nature is giving us some clues!

 

Q16: Why does fish die in slightly acid or distilled water but thrives on slightly alkaline water?

There is no nutrition (oxygen and minerals) in distilled water, the fish would die of starvation.

 

Q16b: Are our cells not like ‘fish’, and would die in slightly acidic or nutrient deficient ‘water’

Our cells are very much like fish swimming in an alkaline sea, and would start to die when the ‘sea’ becomes acidic, just as fish do.

 

Q17: If the fish pond is polluted and the fish is dying, would you inject the fish with chemicals or change the water?

Change the water; the same applies to the blood and other fluids in your body.

This is why a genuine detox, fasting and cleansing program is vital for health.

 

Q18: Why do wine or beer makers need to keep the pH of their brew slightly acidic for fermentation?

[A: Bacteria is needed for fermentation, and bacteria does not grow in alkaline environments – it needs a slight acid environment to grow in. Slight alkaline or too acidic and it would die.]

 

Q18b: Why do wine or beer makers also need to keep the oxygen low?

You must have acidity and low oxygen to ferment (grow) bacteria.

 

Q19: What is the connection between oxygen deficiency, acidity and the growth of bacterial, viral and fungal infections?

Bacterial, viral and fungal infections can only get a foot hold if the environment is acidic.

You can’t grow roses on concrete as Dr Robert Young puts it.

 

Q19b: Why are virtually all pathogenic bacteria anaerobic, and why do they like a slightly acidic environments?

They are all anaerobic, they live in an absence of oxygen, and acidic environments only.

 

Q20: What function or business do pathogenic bacteria have in healthy living tissue?

None whatsoever. Pathogenic bacteria are generally not found in healthy living tissue.

Pathogenic bacteria are not the cause of the disease, just a symptom of an underlying condition.

 

Q21: Didn’t Pasteur prove that pathogenic bacteria caused disease in healthy living tissue?

No, he did not.

Pasteur’s experiments just proved that it was possible to poison someone by injecting them with the poisoned blood of another

 

Q22: What is the origin of bacteria?

The french genius Professor Antoine Bechamp showed that an elementary life form, which he called microzymas, existed in all living things.

It is the origin of bacteria and also DNA, he argued.

What microzymas grows into depends on the environment according to Bechamp.

 

Q23: What is the connection between oxygen deficiency, acidity and the growth of cancer cells?

Cancer cells are anaerobic and live in acidic conditions.

This is the fundamental difference between cancer cells and normal cells; it was shown by Dr Walburg in the 1920’s, see his book ‘The Metabolism of Tumours‘]

 

Q24: Why does a dead body rot?

The body rots because of acidity. When breathing stops, the body becomes acidic. In this environment bacteria multiply rapidly, causing the body to rot.

Q24b: What is the connection between death and scavengers?

Death leads to acidity in body tissue, that leads to the growth of scavengers, special bacteria that grow in this environment, whose job it is to gobble up the edible remains of the dead body.

Q24c: Are pathogenic bacteria scavengers or our killers?

They are scavengers, not our killers.

On death breathing stops. Without oxygen the body can no longer maintain an alkaline balance and starts to acidify. The acidic condition of the cells causes a proliferation of anaerobic bacteria to breed and multiply. The bacteria are scavengers, they eat up the body tissues, decomposing and converting everything to simple forms.

Ashes to ashes, dust to dust‘ as the bible says.

 

Q25: Whenever you see a house on fire, you always see firemen around it; does that mean that the firemen caused the fire?

This is the simple mistake the scientists make, mistaking presence at the scene with being the cause of the scene.

 

Q25b: How would a campaign to kill firemen because they are always connected to fires, reduce house fires?

It won’t, it will make the fires worse!

Modern medicine since Pasteur is based on a silly concept that our health is dependant on being able kill the smallest forms of life. It therefore has embarked on an ever escalating campaign, using more and more complex biological/chemicals weapons to kill simple life forms.

This ‘chemical warfare‘ is conducted on the human body and has contributed to the huge cost and failure of modern medicine to effectively treat even simple diseases.

You can now answer the following questions:

 

Q26: Should we question the sanity behind this modern medical approach?

Q27: Suppose we succeed and eradicate simple life forms, will that mean that we will all be free of disease and live forever?

Q28: You always see flies and maggots around rubbish; does this mean that the flies caused the rubbish?

Q28b: Are mosquito’s the cause of the polluted water in a stagnant pond?

Q29: Why did Rudolph Virchow (Father of Pathology) say:

If I could live my life over again, I would devote it to proving that germs seek their natural habitat, diseased tissue, rather than being the cause of the diseased tissue; e.g., mosquitoes seek the stagnant water, but do not cause the pool to become stagnant“?

 

Q30: Why did Pasteur on his death bed finally recant his germ theory by saying:

The Microbe is nothing. The terrain is everything.”?

 

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Response to Dr Andrew Weil

Home water ionizers…promote the notion that alkaline water is somehow protective of your health. The underlying idea is that you can prevent disease by balancing your body’s pH…None of these claims are true.

Furthermore, your body needs absolutely no help in adjusting its pH…. I get a lot of questions about alkalinity and acidity and whether eating alkaline foods influences the body’s pH in a healthful direction.

There is no scientific research supporting this line of thinking. Alkaline or “hard” water (due to high concentrations of calcium) is common throughout the west but to my knowledge a lifetime of drinking alkaline water hasn’t protected people in the western states from the diseases and disorders that occur elsewhere.

I would suggest that Dr Weil has not looked at all the evidence; the four clinical studies mentioned above show quite clearly that diet plays a significant role in the bodies ability to maintain an alkaline pH balance and bone mineralization.

If you dissolve calcium (or chalk) in a glass and drink it, that doesn’t mean that your body will assimilate the calcium. For the body to absorb minerals, they must be in ionic or colloidal form. If you ionize water with calcium dissolved in it, the calcium ionizes, and evidence indicates that this is better absorbed by the body. Look at people that drink water that naturally has minerals in colloidal form from glaciers like at Hunza.

The Hunza have the longest life span in the world and this has been traced as related to the water that they drink and their natural diet. Hunza has people who routinely live to 120-140 years, in good health with virtually no cancer, degenerative disease, dental caries or bone decay. Hunza people remain robust and strong and are also able to bear children even in old age. Research has proven conclusively that the major common denominator of these healthy long-living people is their local water.

Dr. Henri Coanda, the Romanian father of fluid dynamics and a Nobel Prize winner at 78, spent six decades studying the Hunza water trying to determine what it was in this water that caused such beneficial effects for the body. He discovered that it had a different viscosity and surface tension. Dr. Patrick Flanagan and others continued the research. They found Hunza water had a high alkaline pH and an extraordinary amount of active hydrogen (hydrogen with an extra electron), with a negative redox potential and a high colloidal mineral content. Look also at some clinical studies.

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Authors Experience

I have followed the acid-alkaline based food combining (or as someone called it ‘food not combining’) since the mid 80’s when I read about it in Tony Robbins book Unlimited Power.

I’ve been drinking around 3+ liters alkaline water a day for the last 7+ years. I feel better for it.

This is a telling comment someone made on a Tony Robbins forum. It does not imply any disrespect for Dr Weil due to his weight, just making a point:

“The term MD doesn’t phase me anymore at all. There are way too many authors that have the MD next to their name. Wasn’t Robert Atkins an MD?

At a seminar I met and spoke with Andrew Weil who is an MD that is highly respected I mean highly respected and he looks like he needs to do some sit ups or crunches and run around the block a few times.

His pot belly is brutal, I mean I like to take advice from someone who looks like they practice what they preach and Tony has that quality from the non stop energy and he looks great.

Andrew Weil does not believe in the acid/alkaline theory and boy does he look like it!”

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Dr Robert Young and The New Biology

Many experts like Dr Young maintain that blood pH is the most important measurement. Dr Young has spent a lifetime measuring the slight pH changes of the blood following consumption of acid and alkaline forming foods. Dr Young says

Forget cholesterol counts. Forget calories and fat grams. Forget blood pressure, blood sugar, hormone levels, or any of the other markers of health you’re used to at the doctor’s office.

It turns out that the single measurement most important to your health is the pH of your blood and tissues – how acidic or alkaline it is.

Different areas of the body have different ideal pH levels, but blood pH is the most telling of all. Just as your body temperature is rigidly regulated, the blood must be kept in a very narrow pH range – mildly basic or alkaline.

The body will go to great lengths to preserve that, including wreaking havoc on other tissues or systems. The pH level of our internal fluids affects every cell in our bodies. The entire metabolic process depends on an alkaline environment.

Chronic over acidity corrodes body tissue, and if left unchecked will interrupt all cellular activities and functions, from the beating of your heart to the neural firing of your brain. In other words, over acidity interferes with life itself.

It is at the root of all sickness and disease.

 

The important thing is that blood pH is maintained at 7.365 – you don’t need chemical warfare and dodgy dossiers!

Read this excerpt from the best selling book The pH Miracle Living by Dr Robert O Young.

 

 

Appendix A: Dr Frassetto Study Paper Abstract

Diet, evolution and aging–the pathophysiologic effects of the post-agricultural inversion of the potassium-to-sodium and base-to-chloride ratios in the human diet.

Eur J Nutr. 2001 Oct;40(5):200-13

Frassetto L, Morris RC Jr, Sellmeyer DE, Todd K, Sebastian A.

University of California, San Francisco 94143, USA.

Theoretically, we humans should be better adapted physiologically to the diet our ancestors were exposed to during millions of years of hominid evolution than to the diet we have been eating since the agricultural revolution a mere 10,000 years ago, and since industrialization only 200 years ago.

Among the many health problems resulting from this mismatch between our genetically determined nutritional requirements and our current diet, some might be a consequence in part of the deficiency of potassium alkali salts (K-base), which are amply present in the plant foods that our ancestors ate in abundance, and the exchange of those salts for sodium chloride (NaCl), which has been incorporated copiously into the contemporary diet, which at the same time is meager in K-base-rich plant foods.

Deficiency of K-base in the diet increases the net systemic acid load imposed by the diet. We know that clinically-recognized chronic metabolic acidosis has deleterious effects on the body, including growth retardation in children, decreased muscle and bone mass in adults, and kidney stone formation, and that correction of acidosis can ameliorate those conditions.

Is it possible that a lifetime of eating diets that deliver evolutionarily superphysiologic loads of acid to the body contribute to the decrease in bone and muscle mass, and growth hormone secretion, which occur normally with age? That is, are contemporary humans suffering from the consequences of chronic, diet-induced low-grade systemic metabolic acidosis?

Our group has shown that contemporary net acid-producing diets do indeed characteristically produce a low-grade systemic metabolic acidosis in otherwise healthy adult subjects, and that the degree of acidosis increases with age, in relation to the normally occurring age-related decline in renal functional capacity.

We also found that neutralization of the diet net acid load with dietary supplements of potassium bicarbonate (KHCO3) improved calcium and phosphorus balances, reduced bone resorption rates, improved nitrogen balance, and mitigated the normally occurring age-related decline in growth hormone secretion–all without restricting dietary NaCl. Moreover, we found that co-administration of an alkalinizing salt of potassium (potassium citrate) with NaCl prevented NaCl from increasing urinary calcium excretion and bone resorption, as occurred with NaCl administration alone.

Earlier studies estimated dietary acid load from the amount of animal protein in the diet, inasmuch as protein metabolism yields sulfuric acid as an end-product. In cross-cultural epidemiologic studies, Abelow found that hip fracture incidence in older women correlated with animal protein intake, and they suggested a causal relation to the acid load from protein. Those studies did not consider the effect of potential sources of base in the diet. We considered that estimating the net acid load of the diet (i. e., acid minus base) would require considering also the intake of plant foods, many of which are rich sources of K-base, or more precisely base precursors, substances like organic anions that the body metabolizes to bicarbonate.

In following up the findings of Abelow et al., we found that plant food intake tended to be protective against hip fracture, and that hip fracture incidence among countries correlated inversely with the ratio of plant-to-animal food intake. These findings were confirmed in a more homogeneous population of white elderly women residents of the U.S. These findings support affirmative answers to the questions we asked above.

Can we provide dietary guidelines for controlling dietary net acid loads to minimize or eliminate diet-induced and age-amplified chronic low-grade metabolic acidosis and its pathophysiological sequelae. We discuss the use of algorithms to predict the diet net acid and provide nutritionists and clinicians with relatively simple and reliable methods for determining and controlling the net acid load of the diet. A more difficult question is what level of acidosis is acceptable.

We argue that any level of acidosis may be unacceptable from an evolutionarily perspective, and indeed, that a low-grade metabolic alkalosis may be the optimal acid-base state for humans.

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