Supporters of the Alkaline diet believe that consuming more alkaline and less acidic foods will help change the pH balance of the blood and reduce health risks. It arose from the acid ash hypothesis, which was primarily related to osteoporosis research. According to the acid-ash hypothesis, when there is an excess of blood protons, bone is eroded to provide alkali to buffer the net acidity and maintain physiologic pH.
The alkaline diet is based on the idea that certain foods, such as meat, eggs, beans, wheat, refined sugar, oilseeds, salt, and processed foods, cause your body to produce acid, which is harmful to your health. It claims that by consuming certain drinks and foods, you can protect yourself from deadly diseases, lose weight, and change the body’s acid level, also known as pH levels. pH is a measure of how acidic or basic something is. The range goes from 0 – 14, with 7 being neutral. pHs of less than 7 indicate acidity, whereas a pH of greater than 7 is alkaline (basic).
These diets have been promoted by alternative medicine practitioners, who claim that the diet can heal the body from medical conditions such as cancer, heart disease, kidney disease, Alzheimer’s, and diabetes, as well as help you lose weight. The diet is said to protect against cancer by lowering the amount of acid produced by your body. Cancer cells, according to this hypothesis, thrive in an acidic environment and cannot survive in an alkaline environment; thus, an alkalizing diet would create a more alkaline environment in the body and prevent cancer from growing.
However, scientific evidence does not support the notion that these diets can significantly affect blood pH to treat diseases. While encouraging people to cut out processed foods, and eat more fresh products is good for health, the pH of your food will not affect the pH of your blood. Your body is perfectly capable of maintaining a pH range between 7.35 and 7.45 in your blood, and If it doesn’t, you’ll die if you don’t get medical help. What you eat can affect the pH of your urine, but testing the pH of your urine is unrelated to testing the pH of your blood, which cannot be affected by diet.
It’s impossible to change the pH levels in your blood since many parts of your body have different levels of acidity, with your stomach being the most acidic to assist break down the food you eat.