Acidity in the body is a wide spread health problem! Your good health depends on your body being in the proper acid/alkaline balance! Unfortunately, due to the many acid forming foods that we eat and to other factors there is often times too much acidity in the body. The blood and fluids in our body should have a PH (Potential Hydrogen) of between 7.35-7.45 on a scale of 0-14. Remember, the body is 70% water! The lower the reading the more acidic our body is and the higher the reading the more alkaline we are. The ideal balance is to have our body in a slightly alkaline state. Our lungs and kidneys help maintain the body’s proper PH balance. When our bodies are out of kilter and become too acidic we are opening the door to sickness and disease as well as other health problems.
The body must stay within this narrow PH range. If their is too much acidity in the body it begins to take calcium, sodium, potassium and magnesium from our bones and organs to counteract the increased acid levels. According to the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, “A recent seven year study conducted at the University of California, San Francisco, on 9,000 women showed that those who have chronic acidosis are at greater risk for bone loss than those who have normal pH levels. The scientists who carried out this experiment believe that many of the hip fractures prevalent among middle-aged women are connected to high acidity caused by a diet rich in animal foods and low in vegetables. This is because the body borrows calcium from the bones in order to balance pH.”
This same conclusion was arrived at by another research study. An article in Science Daily reports, “The authors concluded that increasing the alkali content of the diet, for example by consuming more fruits and vegetables, merits further study as a safe and low-cost approach to improving skeletal health in older men and women.” The researchers concluded that this was even more important in maintaining good bone health than increased consumption of calcium to protect bone density.
The same article also reports that, “Fruits and vegetables are metabolized to bicarbonate and thus are alkali-producing. But the typical American diet is rich in protein and cereal grains that are metabolized to acid, and thus are acid-producing. With aging, such diets lead to a mild but slowly increasing metabolic ‘acidosis’ “.
Our body can become pH imbalanced resulting in too much acidity in the body as a result of one or all of the following:
- Foods we eat
- Emotional stress
- Pollutants in the air we breath
- Poor elimination of acids
Acidity in the body can lead to some of the following health problems:
- Cardiovascular damage.
- Weight gain, obesity (an acidic body holds on to fat)
- Diabetes
- Bladder and kidney conditions, including kidney stones
- Immune deficiency
- Free radical damage
- Hormone imbalance
- Premature aging
- Osteoporosis; weak, brittle bones, hip fractures and bone spurs
- Joint pain, aching muscles and lactic acid buildup
- Low energy and chronic fatigue
- Slow digestion and elimination
- Yeast/fungal overgrowth (candida)
It has been suggested that we eat 60% of our foods that are alkaline in nature and 40% that are acidic. That means eating more fresh fruits and vegetables and less meats and grains. Also, keep in mind that beverages like soda pop are very acidic. There are also nutritional supplements that can assist you in maintaining the proper alakaline/acid balance in your body.
Source of article include:
http://www.best-natural-health-supplements.com
Specialities in Family health; autoimmune diseases; mental health; diabetes, cancer; fitness and nutrition.
