What Is It About An Alkaline Diet?

With an alkaline diet it should be possible to protect yourself against cancer and other diseases and to maintain your health. But what is it?

Proponents of an alkaline diet say that this type of diet is good for them and that they are sick less often. But what is an alkaline diet and what are the health benefits? What does science say about alkaline nutrition?

Basic nutrition principles

Tips on alkaline nutrition to prevent or reduce acidification in the body fill books and websites. Theories as to which complaints are caused by over-acidification of the body convince some to switch their diet to alkaline foods.

What is it about an alkaline diet and acidity?

The idea of ​​”acidification” of the body arose around the 17th century, but only became popular in the 20th century by the founder of the “Mayr cure”, Franz Xaver Mayr.

After him, many naturopaths followed these theses and made their own tests and theories on them.

Proponents of the “hyperacidity theory” are convinced that many diseases of civilization such as gout, many allergies, skin diseases and cancer are caused by overacidification of the body.

They base this on the claim that our modern diet of fast food, white flour, sugar, alcohol and other foods recognized as unhealthy leads to too many acids being formed in humans.

What should you watch out for in an alkaline diet?

The conclusion of this previously explained assumption is then the idea that acidification in humans must be prevented with an alkaline diet in order to prevent damage and diseases. This basic diet consists of a long list of basic foods.

These include, for example

• Potatoes,
• Vegetables,
• Fruit,
• Dried fruits and
• Raw milk.

Although raw milk is classified as basic, milk products such as cheese are classified as acidifying. If it is not possible to compensate for the assumed acidic acidity with the diet, base powder should also help.

How does the body become acidic?

The basis of the alkaline diet is the idea that the body becomes too acidic due to improper nutrition or stress and that this imbalance must be regulated through diet. However, this idea is not scientifically tenable, because a healthy person regulates the acid-base ratio all by itself and does not need a special diet or certain base powders or other alkaline or base-forming agents.

However, the body automatically excretes excess acids again and again ; they do not have to be balanced by a special alkaline diet. This mechanism takes place automatically in a healthy body: most of the excess acids absorbed through food intake are excreted through the kidneys, but breath, sweat and stool also contain acids.

Only in really sick people can, in rare individual cases, really get too many acids into the blood. But even then there is no over-acidification for a long time, because the body simply provides calcium from the bones in order to re-harmonize the acid-base balance.

Demonstration of basic nutrition

Supporters of the alkaline diet often measure the pH of their urine as evidence to prove that their body is acidic. If an alleged hyperacidity is diagnosed with a pH test strip on the toilet, this only means that the body’s natural regulatory mechanisms are working properly.

If the urine is acidic, the body has just excreted excess acids on its own. Incidentally, the pH value of the urine always fluctuates throughout the day.

The opinion of medicine and science is very clear on this subject: an over-acidification of the body is only possible with really severe metabolic disorders, but is fundamentally not caused by our diet.

So far, not a single scientific study has found a connection between “acidosis” and diseases.

Who does an alkaline diet help?

Surely you have someone in your circle of friends or acquaintances who has had good experiences with an alkaline diet because he or she may have lost weight as a result, or was able to regulate the digestion or simply feels fitter.

This effect can be traced back to a very simple reason: a side effect of the alkaline diet is that people deal more intensively with what they eat and therefore eat more consciously and usually a little healthier.

Anyone who does not eat white flour products, sugar, alcohol, fast food, fatty cheese and other supposedly acidic foods more or less often, automatically eats healthier – and of course also feels the positive effects of a healthier diet – or sees them on the scales.

A healthy diet is always possible without food supplements such as base powder. Incidentally, the consumer center also classifies food supplements as “unnecessary”. Like doctors, she refers to the natural and automatic buffer system in our body, which is able to produce – and maintain – the acid-base balance itself at any time and without special food.