Alkaline diet
Why an alkaline diet may sound compelling.
1. When eating something acidic, you may experience an acidic burning sensation so it appears to make sense that eating alkaline foods will prevent that. However, that is wrong.
As the chapter on heartburn explains, although some acidic foods my trigger pain, they are not the cause of the problem.
2. If stomach acid refluxing is the problem, we can neutralise it by choosing alkaline foods. Again, that is wrong.
When any food lands in the stomach, it immediately becomes acidic. Foods we consume may vary from very acidic, like lemon at around pH2, to least acidic, like cocnut milk at around pH6, but stomach acid can be around pH1.
The pH scale is logarythmic. pH1 is ten times as acidic as pH2 which is 10 times as acidic as pH3 etc. pH7 is neutral.
No foods are actually alkaline though some charts issued by promoters of an alkaline diet publish lists that attempt to show they are.
This clip from a screenshot of a popular chart highlights the deception:
Meats have low acidity whilst fruits and vegetables are usually high but alkaline diet promotors suggest it's the other way round claiming once metabolised their pHs change.
The chart from which the above image was taken, claims meat to be around pH3 and pure water at pH5, although it is defined as pH7!
One can understand that anyone with an interest in diet would wish to promote healthy choices like fruit and vegetables but they are misleading us with pseudoscience.
3. Other claims for alkaline diet suggest they reduce cancer risk by increasing the blood's pH. It may be true that tumours thrive in an acidic environment as this 2019 paper from Massachusetts Institute of Technology, How tumors behave on acid states: "Acidic environment triggers genes that help cancer cells metastasize" but the blood's pH of between 7.35 and 7.45 is strictly controlled by the body through respiration and urination. If we were able to change that by a small fraction, we'd become very ill and probably die.
This 2022 paper from Nebraska Medicine, Science and the alkaline diet: Can acidic foods cause cancer? concluded: The bottom line: According to evidence-based science, a diet focused on specific alkaline foods can't change your blood's pH. Thus, the alkaline diet can't prevent or treat cancer.
Page updated 26 March 2024