The ACID/ALKALINE (diet) "hypothesis" which is actually the basis for many of the other claims currently "on the market."Mike Huckabee,
Ben Carson,
- Mike Huckabee Thinks Selling Bogus Cancer Treatments will make Him a ‘Heck of a Good President’
- Mike Huckabee and the diabetes cure he endorsed that 'no health agency supports'
- Huckabee Defends His Scam Diabetes 'Cure'
Rand Paul
- Ben Carson’s alternative cancer cure testimonial for Mannatech
- Dr. Ben Carson on Glyconutrients
- Ben Carson’s Troubling Connection
Chris Christy
- Rand Paul Belonged To Fringe Medical Group That Promoted AIDS Denialism
- Rand Paul's vaccine comments expose his greatest weakness as a presidential candidate
- Rand Paul's Vaccine Conspiracy Theories Come Back to Haunt Him - Rachel Maddow Show
As I noted in my initial post on this topic, "[t]his post is based on 8 years of digging for information for personal use. I regret that when I gathered this information I never thought I would be conveying it in any meaningful way and therefore I do not have citations for this information. Basically these are my "notes" re-written, I am not the originator of any of this information."
Since that time I have been attempting to re-create my original source material or things relatively close. The basic outline of the entire piece is from the following all mish-mashed together:
- Acid/Alkaline Theory of Disease Is Nonsense by Gabe Mirkin, M.D.Alkaline Diet
- The Alkaline Diet Myth: An Evidence-Based Review
- Alkaline Diet
- The Acid-Alkaline Myth: Part 1
- The Acid-Alkaline Myth: Part 2
Bad health claims
Melissa Etheridge
I went on the Internet and googled acid and alkaline. There's been a few books written, but no one has really come up with an exact answer because a person's acid/alkaline balance has to do with their own body. But there are foods that definitely produce acid, like red meat, processed food, and dairy. So I cut all of that out, and when I was on chemo I ate purely alkaline foods, which are fruits - especially citrus fruits - vegetables, potatoes, and avocado. I would drink lemon water all day long - it's like Pepto-Bismol in your stomach!Kim Tinkham, the woman whom Oprah made famous, dead at 53
Once you realize how powerful food is, that it can make you better when you come out of the chemo, you want to stay balanced. Instead of eating 70 percent acid, it's 70 percent potatoes, avocados, asparagus, fruits, and these types of wonderful things. Then you realize, I can have that hot-fudge sundae with my kids every couple weeks and it's not going to hurt me. It's about balance. I don't do without anything - I love it all! I just don't do it every day.
Kim Tinkham WAS a cash-cow for one Robert O. Young. Young swindled Tinkham of her money until she died in 2010, three years after being dx'd with stage-3 breast cancer. As noted, Young is NOT a doctor and has faced faced prosecution 3 times, the most recent in 2014.
Our bloodstream and organs control acidity in a very narrow range, anything that changed acidity in our bodies would make us very sick and could even kill.
Think of it this way, what happens when you hold your breath?
Carbon dioxide accumulates in your bloodstream very rapidly and your blood turns acidic. Do it too long you will become uncomfortable or even pass out, which forces you to start breathing again and the pH returns to normal. Or if your kidneys are damaged and cannot regulate the acidity of your bloodstream, chemical reactions stop, poisons accumulate in your bloodstream, and you can die. [1]
The main premise:
When we eat “acid-forming” products our bodies turn “acidic” and illness results. To compensate we then leach calcium from our bones. If we continue to maintain a high acid diet, our bodies will shed calcium and we can end up with osteoporosis, and other chronic diseases.
There are studies that clearly back that simple response, these are but a few:
Causal assessment of dietary acid load and bone disease: a systematic review & meta-analysis applying Hill's epidemiologic criteria for causalityThe kidneys, not bone, regulate blood pH.
A causal association between dietary acid load and osteoporotic bone disease is not supported by evidence and there is no evidence that an alkaline diet is protective of bone health.The acid-base hypothesis: diet and bone in the Framingham Osteoporosis Study
Together these results support the role of base forming foods and nutrients in bone maintenance. The role of protein appears to be complex and is probably dependent on the presence of other nutrients available in a mixed diet. A balanced diet with ample fruit and vegetables and adequate protein appears to be important to bone mineral density.Low urine pH and acid excretion do not predict bone fractures or the loss of bone mineral density: a prospective cohort study
There were no associations between either urine pH or acid excretion and either the incidence of fractures or change of BMD after adjustment for confounders.Nutritional disturbance in acid–base balance and osteoporosis: a hypothesis that disregards the essential homeostatic role of the kidney
Urine pH and urine acid excretion do not predict osteoporosis risk.
The nutritional acid load hypothesis of osteoporosis is reviewed from its historical origin to most recent studies with particular attention to the essential but overlooked role of the kidney in acid–base homeostasis,,,.It stemmed from classic investigations in patients suffering from chronic kidney diseases (CKD) conducted in the 1960s.
When we digest things like protein, the acids are buffered by bicarbonate ions in the blood. This produces carbon dioxide and salts, which are exhaled through the lungs, and are excreted by the kidneys respectively. This process is cyclic and is how the body maintains the pH of the blood. As the kidneys produce ‘new’ bicarbonate ions, which are returned to the blood to replace the bicarbonate that was initially used to buffer the acid. No involvement from the bones whatsoever.
A second premise one may come across:Dietary Acid Load Is Not Associated with Lower Bone Mineral Density Except in Older Men
These results suggest that, with a possible exception of older men, dietary acid load does not have a measureable negative effect on bone health, regardless of total calcium intake.Low urine pH and acid excretion do not predict bone fractures or the loss of bone mineral density: a prospective cohort study
The objectives of this study were to determine whether 1) low urine pH, or 2) acid excretion in urine,,,predict: a) fragility fractures; and b) five-year change of bone mineral density (BMD) in adults,,,. Urine pH and urine acid excretion do not predict osteoporosis risk.Quality of diet and potential renal acid load as risk factors for reduced bone density in elderly women
We found no relationship between dietary acid load and BMD. We also confirmed the role of well-recognized risk factor for osteoporosis.
Here is another nice analogy from Joe Leech writing at Authority Nutrition:
When you metabolise foods and extract the energy (calories) from them, you are actually burning the foods, except that it happens in a slow and controlled fashion.Here is a bit more in depth answer but simplified. Yes, foods can influence our urine pH. No, foods don’t influence our blood pH (overall body pH).
When you burn foods, they actually leave an ash residue, just like when you burn wood in a furnace.
As it turns out, this ash can be acidic or alkaline (or neutral)… and proponents of this diet claim that this ash can directly affect the acidity of your body.
So if you eat foods with acidic ash, it makes your body acidic. If you eat foods with alkaline ash, it makes your body alkaline. Neutral ash has no effect. Simple.
Acid ash is thought to make you vulnerable to illness and disease, whereas alkaline ash is considered protective. By choosing more alkaline foods, you should be able to “alkalize” your diet and improve health.
Milk and acid-base balance: proposed hypothesis versus scientific evidence
Measurement of an acidic pH urine does not reflect metabolic acidosis or an adverse health condition. The modern diet, and dairy product consumption, does not make the body acidic. Alkaline diets alter urine pH but do not change systemic pH. Net acid excretion is not an important influence of calcium metabolism. Milk is not acid producing. Dietary phosphate does not have a negative impact on calcium metabolism, which is contrary to the acid-ash hypothesis.Potential renal acid load of foods and its influence on urine pH
This calculation methodology, primarily based on PRAL, allows an appropriate prediction of the effects of diet on the acidity of urine. For practical applicability in dietetic prevention of recurrent urolithiasis or in other fields of dietetics, the additionally determined correlation (r = .83; P < .001) between NAE and urine pH can be used to ascertain NAE target values for a desired urine pH modification.Here is why, and it falls under understanding "acid-base homeostasis."
All foods leave behind acid or alkaline ash which is determined by the relative content of acid-forming components (ie. phosphate and sulfur) and alkalis (ie. calcium, magnesium, and potassium.). In general, animal products and grains are acid forming, while fruits and vegetables are alkali forming. So if we have, let's say, steak and eggs for breakfast, our urine will be more acidic; if we have a kale smoothie it will tend towards alkaline. But bare in mind, our urine is the waste dump of metabolic processes, our bladders are the sealed storage container. Measuring the urinary pH is nonsense because your blood pH does not change unless you’re seriously ill.
"Proponents of the alkaline diet have put forth ideas about how an acidic diet harms our health." According to Chris Kesser, the claim that we can change the pH of our blood by changing the foods we eat, and that acidic blood causes disease (while alkaline blood prevents it), is not true. As mentioned above, the body tightly regulates the pH of our blood and we cannot influence it by changing our diet. And FYI Scientists have known since the 1930s that the foods we eat do have an effect on our urine pH, but if they were to significantly alter the balance of acidity/alkalinity in our blood, we would die. In other words, the A/A hypothesis of diet is old news.
"Cancer cells grow faster in an acidic environment"
Destroyed by Science recently put out a nice piece explaining both.
I honestly wonder if pseudoscience sellers deliberately find pieces of science that they can deliberately twist and take out of context in order to sell their products and ideas; or if they genuinely believe in their own intellectual dishonesty. Here for instance, the fact that the acidic microenvironment caused by cancer cells has been hypothesised to lead to more aggressive invasive behaviour during carcinogenesis (9); is used dishonestly in two ways. Firstly, to lead people to believe that their “acidic” body pH has caused them to develop cancer in the first place, and secondly, to believe that they will be able to create an alkaline environment in their body that will be unfavourable to cancer cells, causing them to grow more slowly or perish selectively, leaving healthy cells untouched.It’s not the acidic environment that causes the cancer; it’s the cancer that causes the acidic environment
Leaving aside the fact that results from in vitro experiments cannot just be translated to what occurs in a living organism; most studies on cancer cells are done in a medium with a pH of 7.2-7.4 (10) which is not acidic. The reason that these conditions are used is that this also conveniently happens to be very close to the pH of extracellular fluid (blood plasma, interstitial fluid) (11) experienced within the human body. The human body also conveniently has a number of mechanisms that ensure this pH does not go outside a very strict range (7.35-7.41) – if it does, the consequences are dire, as in, death. A blood pH level of 8.5 would be a very bad thing. Lets be honest- whether or not cancer cells can be killed by an extreme environment is irrelevant if the extreme environment is going to lead to the death of a patient. This is really no different from saying “Hey, I can destroy these cancer cells in this test tube with napalm. Who wants in?”.
It is as DBS explains a "misappropriation of the Warburg Effect, when cancer cells shift to glycolysis and continue to rely primarily on glycolysis rather than respiration even in the presence of adequate oxygen."
Writing for Respectful Insolence, Dr. David Gorski, aka "Orac" explains it thusly,
He’s [referring to Otto Warburg] a Nobel Laureate, and his discovery of how cancer cells shift to glycolysis and continue to rely primarily on glycolysis rather than respiration even in the presence of adequate oxygen. Indeed, this effect, called the Warburg Effect, is an important difference between tumor cells and normal cells. Moreover, this difference in metabolism is the basis of drugs like dichloroacetate,, a frequent topic of this blog. Of course, even ol’ Otto had a bit of trouble with hyperbole. For one thing, animal cells certainly can undergo glycolysis; muscle cells do it all the time under duress. Long distance runners, in particular, are familiar with glycolysis. That’s why it’s overstating the case a bit to say that “one can scarcely picture a greater difference,” particularly since not all tumors even exhibit the Warburg effect. I can forgive Warburg, though, a bit of hyperbole–although it is known that he became a bit of an eccentric in his later years. In any case, Dr. Young’s invocation of Warburg is especially wrong, given that the lactic acid generated by glycolysis is a result of the alteration in cancer cell metabolism, not a cause. It’s like saying the exhaust fumes from a car are the cause of the car’s motion,,,.
Examining the relationship between diet-induced acidosis and cancer
There is limited evidence to suggest that dietary acidosis alone is sufficient in increasing cancer risk, but it may function in concert with other factors associated with cancer risk. Obesity or metabolic syndrome,,,,.Acidic pH enhances the invasive behavior of human melanoma cells
In conclusion, there are numerous systemic pathways affected by diet-induced acidosis that may be cancer promoting, but a causal role is poorly defined. Moreover, the contribution of diet-induced acidosis in driving carcinogenesis would be difficult to measure especially since the effects appear to accumulate for a long period of time.
Causes and Consequences of Increased Glucose Metabolism of Cancers
Acid treatment of melanoma cells selects for invasive phenotypes
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