Articles by Dr. Erdman are for informational purposes, and are not to be taken as specific medical advice.
I want to touch on a trending ‘holistic’ fad that seems to be gaining a foot hold locally. It purports to offer positive, healthful, healing benefits; yet defies known, unalterable facts. This is a lesson in human anatomy and physiology facts. I am not talking right vs. wrong or truth vs. lies, just facts.Today, I will try to explain this notion of body alkalinity vs. acidity. We have such things as alkaline water and alkaline diets being held up as the next great healers of disease. The problem is, there has never been one study done in 30 years of this claim, to show any benefit, or if it can be accomplished at all. I submit, it can not.
It is not my agenda to push a belief. A belief is defined as "a state or habit of mind in which trust or confidence is placed in some person or thing.” I believe Jesus walked on this earth. That is statement of belief. I didn't see Him, talk to Him or touch Him. I simply choose to believe others accounts that did. Statements of fact sound like these: The earth has gravitational pull; a loss of oxygen to the brain for mere seconds will kill you; the ph of the body is 7.4, and never varies more than 1% either way, or you will die. Don’t just believe me, check the facts for yourself.
This alkalinity theory is being put forth by Dr. Robert O Young. There is quite a lot of controversy in the alternate heath community about whether the body should be regulated to a more acidic or more alkaline direction. I’m not going to try to prove either one. Instead, let’s make sure factual observations about how the body works are based on known science.
The body works hard to maintain a ph between 7.35 and 7.45, a pretty tight range. The body requires these tight parameters so all other body parts can do their functions normally. The body maintains this tight delicate balance of ph by breathing, the oxidation process. You will breathe out more or less CO2 (carbon dioxide) depending on whether your blood is being pushed in a more or less alkaline condition. Notice I said more or less alkaline. That is because the range of 7.35 to 7.45 ph is all within the alkaline range. There is no such thing as an alkaline/acidic balance. It’s either measured as alkaline or acidic, not a ‘balance.”
The purveyors of this alkaline theory often have you measure the ph of your saliva or urine as a test of your body ph. This is also a gimmick. If you are eating the so called alkaline diet, and drinking the alkaline waters, you are definitely leading your body into a more alkaline disposition. Your systems, then, must off load some of the alkalinity. To do this, your breathing may slow as a first response. The body’s best response is to add excess alkalinity to the urine. The blood ph will still never get above 7.45, or you die. This means that proving your body is in an “alkaline” state by testing urine is pure fiction. Well, what about saliva? Saliva changes ph rapidly in both directions. Studies done to show this have proven saliva ph changes simply by showing a person pictures of food, or odors of food. Just because your saliva changes ph, does not mean your body ph changes.
People around the world are told that if you raise their body ph to a more alkaline state, the diseases will not exist in their bodies. Next week, we will look at why this cannot possibly be true.