Alkaline Diets – Where’s the Science?
The latest trend in alternative health circles is to advocate having an alkaline diet. There are currently many books on the market about acid-base balance in the human body. Most, if not all, of the authors of these books recommend an alkaline diet. The group think is that Americans eat too much meat and too many grain based, processed foods. Since grains and meat are both acid forming, the the common thinking is that everyone must be too acidic. Personally, I think this assumption is not necessarily true for the reasons listed below.
When an Acid Diet May be Best
1. I’ve never actually seen any actual research studies supporting the assertion that most Americans are suffering from acidosis. Alternative health experts often make this claim, but personally I’ve never seen it backed up by any actual studies or hard numbers. What people think is true is often not true. People used to have the perception that most millionaires live in mansions and drive fancy cars, like theClampetts in the Beverly Hillbillies, but when the authors of the book The Millionaire Next Dooractually studied millionaires, they found that most of them were quite frugal. It turns out that many millionaires clip coupons and shop at Costco. So sometimes what people think must be true may not be true at all. I could make the claim that since many people in the U.S. take mineral supplements and mineral supplements tend to be alkaline, then most people must be suffering from alkalosis. (I don’t really have no idea of that is true, but it makes as much sense to make a broad claim like that in support of alkalosis as it does for the mass acidosis theory.)
2. In my family, we have been doing pH testing for years. In a given week some people with have acid test results and some will have alkaline test results, given similar diets. One person may be acid one week and alkaline the next. Without actual testing, I could not predict who in my family may be too acidic, so it seems unlikely to me that I can’t make any predictions for my family anyone could make an accurate prediction for the population at large.
3. Recent studies show that people consumption of acid foods such as vinegar, coffee and sourdough bread can lower glucose levels. Glucose level are high in people with diabetes. Diabetes is reaching epidemic proportions in the U.S. and other industrialized countries. These facts would indicate that at least some, if not many, people may possibly improve their health by having a more acid diet.
4. Nutritionists recommend acid ash diets for people with calcium based kidney stones, which are the most common type of kidney stones.Some experts estimate that approximately three percent of the adult population in the United States will develop urinary calculi at some point in their lifetime. Uric acid based kidney stones respond better to alkaline ash diets. Clearly then not all people with kidney stones should be on an alkaline forming diet. For some people this type of diet may make their stones worse.
Balance is Best
It is easy enough to check urine pH, so rather than assume that everyone would benefit by an alkaline forming diet, it would be more logical to encourage people to consume a healthy diet based on their own individual needs.
