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The Underappreciated Role of Carbon Dioxide in Health
Reproduced from original article:
https://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2024/03/03/co2-benefits.aspx
The original Mercola article may not remain on the original site, but I will endeavor to keep it on this site as long as I deem it to be appropriate.
Analysis by Dr. Joseph Mercola March 03, 2024
STORY AT-A-GLANCE
- CO2 is typically thought of as nothing more than a harmful waste product of respiration, but it’s actually a driver of mitochondrial energy production, and it improves the delivery of oxygen into your cells
- One of the simplest ways to optimize your CO2 is by breathing properly. Most people tend to over-breathe, which causes you to expel too much CO2. Proper breathing involves breathing less and breathing slower. Both of these allow CO2 to build up, and that appears to be part of why breathwork has such wide-ranging benefits
- To have sufficient CO2 production, you need healthy mitochondria because CO2 is produced exclusively in the Krebs cycle in the mitochondria. If you have mitochondrial dysfunction, if you’re hypothyroid or have high levels of inflammation, then you will not be producing enough CO2
- When your CO2 is too low, your body reverts to an “emergency” vasodilator, nitric oxide (NO). Drawbacks of elevated NO include peroxynitrite species formation and pseudohypoxia. NO also damages the polyunsaturated fats (PUFAs) in your cells, and inhibits energy production
- CO2 combats cancer development by lowering the pH of the cell, thereby allowing extra water to be excreted. This is the opposite of linoleic acid (LA) and estrogen, both of which suck water in and cause the cell to swell. Cellular swelling is a feature of cancer cells
In this interview, repeat guest Georgi Dinkov reviews the role of carbon dioxide (CO2) in health. CO2 is typically thought of as nothing more than a harmful waste product of respiration, but it’s actually a driver of mitochondrial energy production, and it improves the delivery of oxygen into your cells.
While this may come as a shock to most people, of all the strategies I know of to increase life extension, CO2 is one of the most effective longevity interventions available. There really isn’t anything that comes close, other than a low linoleic acid diet and reducing estrogen dominance.
Unfortunately, virtually no doctors understand this. The now deceased Ray Peat, a biologist and physiologist who developed the bioenergetic theory of health,1 was one of the few who understood it inside and out, and actually recommended its clinical use.
I wrote an article about this that featured his lecture on CO2, which I watched six times as it catalyzed my interest in the topic. At the time I found his video there were fewer than 2,000 views on YouTube. You can find it by going to YouTube and typing in Ray Peat CO2.
Proper Breathing Is Important for Optimal CO2 Levels
One of the simplest ways to optimize your CO2 is by breathing properly. Unfortunately, bad advice is rampant in the breathing arena as well. The problem is that most people tend to over-breathe, which causes them to expel (breathe out) too much CO2, resulting in respiratory alkalosis. Chronic CO2 deficiency will also contribute to premature death.
In a nutshell, “proper” or life-extending breathing involves breathing less and breathing slower. Both of these allow CO2 to build up, and that appears to be part of why breathwork has such wide-ranging benefits.
“As it turns out, carbon dioxide, even though medically it’s mostly viewed as a waste product of respiration, is actually the thing that protects us from oxygen’s well-known toxicity,” Dinkov explains.
“In fact, if you speak to people who work in trauma or in the intensive care unit, when they have to revive people that are in shock or have suffered some kind of ischemic attack, they will tell you that the premature delivery of oxygen, or delivering too much oxygen … is actually what kills most patients after they come out of the initial shock stage.
The introduction of too much oxygen too quickly creates this massive cytokine storm and inflammatory reaction, and one of the reasons [for that] is that the cells are hypermetabolic — they’re not producing sufficient carbon dioxide, so they’re not able to utilize the oxygen properly.”
Forgotten Truths
It’s rather surprising that the benefits of CO2 have become forgotten considering its historical use. Asian cultures, for example, have a long history of using carbonated water for its health benefits.
The Romans recommended taking baths in naturally carbonated water for all kinds of ailments but especially arthritis, infertility and psychiatric ailments, and this practice extended well into the Middle Ages when monks prescribed it. To this day many visit natural hot springs, and the likely benefit in many of these springs is the CO2 content of the water.
In the 20th century, Russian scientists did loads of research on CO2, and to this day, many Russian clinics offer CO2 baths and other CO2 treatments. There’s even a suit that can be filled up with CO2, which then diffuses into your tissues. You’ll start feeling hot very rapidly and this is a sign of vasodilation, which is one of the cardiovascular effects of CO2.
It’s been shown that CO2 can, over the long term, even reverse arterial calcification. It can also reverse many other signs of and damage caused by the aging process.
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Mitochondrial Dysfunction Inhibits CO2 Production
The key, though, is that in order to have sufficient CO2 production, you need healthy mitochondria, because CO2 is produced exclusively in the Krebs cycle in the mitochondria. If you have mitochondrial dysfunction, if you’re hypothyroid or have high levels of inflammation, then you will not be producing enough CO2.
When your CO2 is too low, your body reverts to an “emergency” vasodilator, nitric oxide (NO). There are three types of nitric oxide:2 neuronal nitric oxide synthases (nNOS); endothelial NOS (eNOS); and inducible NOS (iNOS). Low CO2 triggers iNOS. The problem with that is that now you’re overproducing NO, which is not ideal. Dinkov explains:
“Most of the eNOS … stays in the actual blood vessel. iNOS also spills into the blood. That’s kind of the purpose of iNOS because the primary purpose of nitric oxide in the body is to fight pathogens. It’s a reactive nitrogen species.
It’s produced for only two reasons, either as an emergency vasodilator, or if the immune system senses an invasion from pathogens, specifically bacteria and viruses, in which case iNOS is activated.
The reason iNOS is bad is because the nitric oxide does not stay localized. It’s made available systemically because you want to affect all blood vessels, and that’s what happens when you don’t have sufficient amounts of carbon dioxide production. So, if you don’t have [enough] CO2, you will have elevated NO.
But with NO, nitric oxide, you have a lot of other bad things happening. It’s a highly reactive molecule. It can form peroxynitrite species. It can damage the polyunsaturated fats (PUFAs) in the cells, no matter where they are.
Nitric oxide itself can form a covalent bond with something called cytochrome c oxidase [Complex 4 in the electron transport chain], which is the rate limiting step of the oxidative phosphorylation …
You want to break that bond because otherwise your oxidative phosphorylation is inhibited. Methylene blue can do it, magnesium can do it, carbon dioxide can do it, near-infrared light and some quinols.”
Another significant problem associated with elevated NO is pseudohypoxia, because you have oxygen in the cells but it cannot be utilized because No impairs Complex IV in the electron transport chain.
CO2 prevents this by dissociating the covalent bond between NO and Complex IV. Hence, oxygenation is optimized when sufficient CO2 is present. So, to summarize, CO2 keeps your blood vessels supple without the drawback of blocking Complex IV.
The Bohr Effect
Needless to say, optimal delivery of oxygen is crucial for good health. Oxygen from the air binds to hemoglobin when you inhale and enter your blood circulation. This bond is relatively strong. To break that bond and deliver the oxygen where it’s needed, you need CO2. This is known as the Bohr Effect.
Basically, the Bohr Effect describes the process in which CO2 weakens the bond between oxygen and hemoglobin so that the oxygen can separate and enter into the tissues.
As the hemoglobin releases the oxygen, it binds to the CO2 instead. The CO2 is then expelled through your outbreath. Without enough CO2, you will not be able to liberate sufficient amounts of oxygen from hemoglobin.
A Note on Oxygen Saturation
On a side note, a pulse oximeter measures the amount of oxygen in your blood. However, if your CO2 is extremely low, it could still read 100% saturation because you’re not dissociating the oxygen. It’s circulating in your bloodstream but cannot be used.
The major factor that determines your tissue oxygenation is how much CO2 you’re producing. If you’re hypermetabolic, if your mitochondria are not working, then you’re oxidizing mostly fats, which produces less CO2 per molecule, so you’ll be deficient in CO2.
In the past (going back 100 years ago or so), the test for seizure susceptibility was hyperventilating. The doctor would instruct you to breathe through your mouth very quickly for 30 seconds, and if seizure symptoms emerged, it was a sign that you have insufficient CO2, as that’s what’s causes the seizure activity.
How CO2 Can Combat Cancer
Another important aspect of CO2 is that it lowers the pH of your cells, thereby allowing extra water to be excreted. This is the exact opposite of linoleic acid (LA) and estrogen, both of which suck water into your cells which causes the cells to swell. Cellular swelling, aside from being the cause of edema, is also a feature of cancer cells. So, you don’t want your cells to retain excess fluids. Dinkov explains:
“Because carbon dioxide is a Lewis acid, it’s an electron withdrawing agent, even though it doesn’t directly bind them like a quinol. If you look at the structure, it’s very similar to a quinol. It’s a carbon atom with two carbonyl groups, and the quinol is very similar. They usually have a ring and two or more carbonyl groups.
Lewis acids drop the pH of the cell, which automatically decreases the cell’s affinity for water. Which means you’re going to be excreting some of that extra water of the cell.
It’s not a coincidence that linoleic acid has multiple double bonds. It’s much more hydrophilic than the saturated fats, which lack the double bonds. Any time you have an increase of intracellular pH, you have increased affinity for water. The moment water streams in, that’s a signal for de-differentiation and metosis (division). If this process continues uncontrollably, we basically get cancer.
Conversely, when you excrete water, the cell becomes acidified and a little bit dehydrated, so to speak. Then you’re getting high amounts of differentiation. You’re also increasing the affinity of the intracellular proteins for potassium and magnesium, while decreasing their affinity for sodium and calcium. In fact, when carbon dioxide is produced and streams out of the cell, it draws calcium and sodium with it.
If you’re not producing sufficient amounts of carbon dioxide, you’re also probably not producing sufficient amounts of ATP, because carbon dioxide and ATP go hand in hand; they’re signs of good mitochondrial function. ATP has affinity for magnesium, but if you don’t have sufficient amounts of ATP, you’ll have more ADP, which is the degraded version.
ADP has an affinity for calcium. So low metabolic rate, by definition, means cellular excitotoxicity, cellular alkalinity and cellular division, because of the lack of carbon dioxide and the lack of the ATP. ATP always exists in the body in a complex with magnesium. So, if you’re taking magnesium but not producing sufficient amounts of ATP, it will not become bioavailable. But the production of ATP is tied to the production of carbon dioxide.
Carbon dioxide also increases the uptake of serotonin into the platelets, so producing sufficient amounts of carbon dioxide will lower your extracellular levels of serotonin.
It also increases the uptake of histamine, a very highly inflammatory mediator. Its transport also depends on carbon dioxide and on sodium as well, just like the serotonin … So, almost everything that you do metabolically, in terms of health, depends on the production of CO2. It’s not a waste product.”
Respiratory Alkalosis and Cancer
Cells can only produce a certain amount of CO2 per unit of time, so when you breathe too fast, you overwhelm your cells’ ability to maintain an appropriate level of CO2. As a result, you’ll have excess oxygen circulating in your blood stream, but because the CO2 production cannot keep up with the amount of CO2 you exhale, you end up with respiratory alkalosis.
Respiratory alkalosis also increases intracellular water uptake, as just described, and as the pH of the cell increases, it causes overproduction of several inflammatory mediators, including lactate, which is another hallmark of cancer cells.
“Cancer cells are highly alkaline, they’re overproducing a lot of lactate and they have a very high uptake of water,” Dinkov says. “In fact, I think the word tumor is a Latin word which meant swelling.
You can reduce the swelling of the tumor to a tremendous degree simply by either increasing delivery of CO2 around the tumor, if it’s on the surface, or increasing uptake of CO2 through a CO2 bath or drugs that increase the levels of CO2 in the blood.”
Drugs that increase CO2 include carbonic and hydrate inhibitors such as acetazolamide, which decrease the degradation of CO2, allowing more CO2 to build up in your blood.
CO2 Benefits Your Entire Body
A nearly 150-year-old medical book describes the many uses and health benefits of CO2 that were known at the time. It basically included the entire body, and an extensive list of ailments of the day, including:
| Dementia | Psychiatric disorders like mania |
| Dysentery | Fistulas |
| Fibrotic conditions | Whooping cough |
| Tuberculosis | Rhinitis |
“Really, every condition you can think of, both physiological and mental, can be remediated, and in many cases cured, by increasing endogenous CO2 production and decreasing degradation,” Dinkov says. Migraines, are another common ailment that can be addressed with CO2. In many cases migraines are due to overbreathing causing a lack of CO2 that constricts the blood vessels in your brain.
Exogenous CO2 Delivery Methods
While it’s obviously important to optimize your endogenous (internal) production of CO2, exogenous delivery or supplementation will definitely produce the greatest benefits, as you can deliver far greater amounts than your body can produce. Such strategies include:
| Breathing into a paper bag | Drinking carbonated water and other carbonated beverages |
| CO2 baths | A special suit into which CO2 is pumped |
| Hyperbaric administration | Taking small amounts of baking soda in your drinking water |
One of our readers, LSquare, shared their experience with bag breathing in treating their hypertension a few days ago and I thought you would enjoy their story in case you did not see it in the comment section.
“Exercise, regular walking, and upping my potassium helped to lower my hypertension to the 120-130’s. However, I started doing the paper bag breathing when Dr M first mentioned it last month, and the results could not be more amazing. My systolic readings now are regularly now less than 110, and my diastolic ones are in the 50s.
I just had my annual physical 2 weeks ago, and my Dr. REMOVED hypertension from my records. Bad things are almost never removed from your ‘permanent record’. And I’d only done the CO2 breathing for several days before that appt. I implore you to try it if you suffer from High BP. It’s free, and it only costs you 4-6 minutes a day.”
A book written in 1905 by Achilles Rose, M.D. discusses various methods of delivery including inhalation, irrigation and rectal insufflation. It contains case reports of it being used for asthma, whooping cough, dysentery, colitis, rectal fistulas, rhinitis and ear infections. It is a fascinating read.
Why Are Farmers Adding Rocks to Their Fields?
Reproduced from original article:
https://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2023/10/10/rocks-in-fields.aspx
The original Mercola article may not remain on the original site, but I will endeavor to keep it on this site as long as I deem it to be appropriate.
Analysis by Dr. Joseph Mercola Fact Checked October 10, 2023
STORY AT-A-GLANCE
- The pH of soil influences the growth and productivity of crops grown on the land. Soil pH regulates the availability of nutrients to the plant, so, even if the soil is fertile, unless the pH is appropriate, the plants cannot absorb the nutrients
- Lab data show that adding crushed volcanic rock called basalt or olivine can help sequester carbon dioxide, balance the soil pH, and improve crop yield
- Several startup companies have developed programs so farmers are not charged for the rock, delivery or spread across the land since large corporations purchase the rock for “carbon credits”
- Crop productivity, soil health and protecting the environment are also functions of regenerative farming and livestock practices. To protect the environment and your health seek out foods from small farmers using regenerative agricultural practices
Would you add rock to your garden soil and expect a better harvest? That’s exactly what farmers across the country are hoping to see this season.1 Of course, there is a little more to the story than adding rocks to the soil and watching plants grow. It has to do with altering the pH of the soil.
Importance of Soil pH to Crop Productivity
The pH is a measurement of acidity. The measurement ranges from 0 to 14, where 7 is neutral. pH measurements less than 7 are acidic and those greater than 7 indicate a base. Both acids and bases are corrosive and the greater the distance from neutral, the more corrosive the substance.
To put this in perspective,2 blood has a pH of 7.4, and milk, urine and saliva have a pH that ranges from 6.3 to 6.6. More acidic compounds you might find in your home include grapefruit juice and tomato juice, which have a pH of 2.5 to 3.5, or battery acid and hydrochloric acid, which have a pH near zero. On the other side of the scale, baking soda has a pH of 9.5; bleach and oven cleaner have a pH of 13.5; and liquid drain cleaner has a pH of 14.
It turns out that soil pH also makes a difference in the growth and productivity of plants.3 Soil pH might not be the most exciting topic, but having a basic understanding can help improve your gardening efforts. When you consider garden soil, acidic soils generally have a pH that ranges from 4 to 6.5, while alkaline soils have measurements that range from 7.5 to 9.
While pH is not a nutrient, it does regulate the availability of soil nutrients to the plant. In other words, just because your soil is fertile doesn’t mean the plants will be able to absorb the nutrients and thrive. Plants either prefer a soil pH that ranges from 7 to slightly alkaline or ranges from 7 to slightly acidic.
When the soil is too acidic, gardeners and farmers can apply lime to help raise the soil pH. And that’s what farmers have been doing in areas of the country that commonly have acidic soil. According to a map from The Biota of North America Program republished in The Modern Farmer,4 acidic soils, or those with a pH less than 6, occur along the East Coast, through part of the Midwest and along the West Coast of Oregon, California and Washington.
The soil pH is referred to as the “master soil variable”5 since it influences a variety of factors important to plant growth. Soil pH is linked to the chemical environment, biology and geological factors.
Volcanic Basalt Rock May Help Balance Soil pH
A 2018 paper6 published in Nature Plants proposed that crop production and climate change could be positively influenced by adding crushed silicate rock to croplands. The paper theorized that crushed volcanic rock could lower the amount of CO2 that enters the atmosphere and increase crop production and pest and disease protection, as well as restore fertility and structure to the soil.
Silicate is the most important mineral found in igneous rock, which crystallizes from volcanic magma.7 A 2023 paper8 used computer modeling to estimate the total carbon sequestration of enhanced rock weathering (ERW) on croplands. The researchers found that applying 10 tons of basalt dust per hectare (2.47 acres) could sequester 64 gigatons of CO2 over 75 years.
When this was extrapolated to all agricultural land, the mathematical model suggests that ERW could sequester 217 gigatons over 75 years with a few caveats. There is a fraction of the basalt that does not weather, which indicates a need to optimize application and ERW payback in hot and humid environments is significantly shorter.
Application of ERW has been the focus of several startup companies in the past year after lab research demonstrated the potential to improve soil health and reduce carbon emissions.9 The process begins when slightly acidic rain contacts the volcanic rock and converts carbon dioxide to bicarbonate.10 The bicarbonate raises the soil pH and releases minerals into the soil.
Adding pulverized rock to the soil “turbocharges” this natural process, releasing minerals faster within several years, instead of over thousands of years.11 One area where farmers are trying this is the Columbia Basin in Oregon.
Francisco Calderon, director of the Columbia Basin Agricultural Research Center, says that over the years the pH of the topsoil in the area has dropped to 5 and below.12 Chris Rauch is one of those farmers. He grows dryland wheat in the area surrounding Pendleton, Oregon, along the Columbia Plateau that was formed by ancient basalt lava flows.
He first learned about the process during an annual agricultural show in Spokane and was initially doubtful of the process. However, when the latest pH soil results came in at 5.3, he reconsidered his decision.
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Farmers Getting Help at No Charge
Not only was he doubtful of the process, but there was no charge to the farmers for the rock, the delivery or distribution across the land. It seemed too good to be true. However, because enhanced rock weathering is a form of permanent sequestration or carbon dioxide removal, the startup companies supplying the basalt rock can sell “carbon credits” to large corporations.13
It’s a win-win situation for the farmers and the corporations. Farmers receive soil amendments that they hope will help raise the soil pH and improve crop productivity at no charge, while large corporations can demonstrate they are taking some action against climate change.
Initially, Rauch was concerned that the amendment would negatively impact seeding and increase soil compaction. But he found that the basalt blended in as if it were delivered by the wind.
It isn’t only areas where soil pH is naturally acidic that can benefit from ERW. Jesse Vollmar is an agricultural consultant who lives in Michigan, where the natural soil pH is between 6.5 and 7, but years of heavy fertilizer and tilling has taken its toll on the soil.
Vollmar began working with a small ERW startup company in Seattle and has helped other farmers in his area. He told Modern Farmer “It’s just a no-brainer for farmers. The hardest part is keeping up with demand.”14
Farmers in Virginia have also applied basalt to the farmland. Rick Bennett grows several crops on his old tobacco farm that has been heavily farmed for the last two centuries. Bennett tested a plot that had particularly acidic soil by creating test strips to determine if there was a difference in crop production.
Bennett reports he doesn’t see a great deal of difference in the plants. However, he’s waiting until after harvest to evaluate the data on the number of soybean pods and the number of beans in the pods before he decides.
Olivine Can Do More With Less
While basalt is the most common volcanic rock, it’s not the only one. Another is olivine, which is a greenish-colored stone with a higher capacity to capture carbon dioxide.15 Another startup company, EION, uses olivine along the Mississippi River Delta Region where the soil is acidic. According to the CEO and founder of EION, Adam Wolf, the area is an ideal model for managing land.
“They have an appreciation for the natural world,” says Wolf. “It’s not as reductionist as in places like California, where you see vast landscapes dominated by one crop.”16 As Modern Farmer notes,17 the high humidity and heat also increase the reaction speed, allowing olivine to capture more CO2 with less rock.
Instead of spreading 9 to 10 tons of basalt across each acre of land, 2 to 3 tons of olivine is spread per acre. However, olivine cannot be sourced in the U.S., so it is imported from Norway. Once it reaches the Mississippi, it is milled and distributed. A consultant for EION, Dan Prevost, rents patches of low-quality acidic land near his home in Mississippi and helps rebuild the soil using lands nobody else wants.
While the process sounds easy and cost-effective, Civil Eats points out that it hasn’t been widely studied. Phil Renforth is a professor of engineering geology at Cardiff University. He was not involved in the 2018 research paper, but spoke with a reporter from Civil Eats, saying:18
“While enhanced weathering could make an enormous contribution to climate change mitigation, it remains one of the most poorly understood methods of removing CO2 from the atmosphere. As the authors suggest, we need to do a lot more work to establish if these large carbon drawdowns can be achieved, and to assess the positive and negative impacts of this approach.”
Vollmar and Prevost started their journey in regenerative farming and understand the vital importance of soil pH to crop productivity and health, as well as protecting the environment.
Regenerative Farming Helps Protect the Soil and Livestock
Regenerative agriculture and holistic livestock management is a method of organic and food farming that not only avoids pesticides, fertilizers, GMO seeds and excessive greenhouse gas emissions, but regenerates soil fertility, water retention, carbon sequestration and rural livelihoods.
Regeneration has become a hot topic in the natural and organic food sector while climate activists discuss the role of organic and regenerative practices to help reduce greenhouse gas emissions and sequester excess atmospheric carbon dioxide. One regenerative farm example is White Oak Pastures in Bluffton, Georgia.
Run by Will Harris, the farm produces high-quality, grass fed products and has been an inspirational example of how to convert from conventional to regenerative agriculture while thriving financially.
In November 2022,19 Harris spoke with Joe Rogan about the transition from conventional farming practices to regenerative techniques, some of the pitfalls of industrialized farming and how using regenerative techniques has helped to restore the land.
Unfortunately, the majority of meat sold in the U.S. still comes from CAFOs, not grass fed farms. To protect the environment and your health, as well as support animal welfare, seek out food from small farmers using regenerative agricultural practices.
One useful option is to look for the American Grassfed Association (AGA) logo on meat and dairy, which ensures the animals were born and raised on American family farms, fed only grass and forage from weaning until harvest, and raised on pasture without confinement to feedlots.20
Get to know local farmers using regenerative methods near you. Regeneration International, incorporated in 2014, has built a global network of regenerative farmers and ranchers across 60 countries. You can find a map of regenerative farms to secure a source of sustainable food near you.
- 1, 4, 9, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17 Modern Farmer, September 25, 2023
- 2 U.S. Geological Survey, June 19, 2019
- 3 The Spruce, December 9, 2021
- 5 Applied and Environmental Soil Science, 2019;5794869
- 6 Nature Plants, 2018; 4
- 7 Open Geology, 6 Ignaeous Rocks and Silicate Material
- 8 AGU, 2023; doi: 10.1029/2023EF003698
- 10, 11, 18 Civil Eats, April 6, 2018
- 19 The Joe Rogan Experience, November 4, 2022
- 20 American Grassfed Association, Our Standards
Baking soda offers potential anticancer effect, multiple studies reveal
Reproduced from original article:
https://www.naturalhealth365.com/baking-soda-offers-potential-anticancer-effect-multiple-studies-reveal.html
by: Jonathan Landsman | February 22, 2023
(NaturalHealth365) Sodium bicarbonate, better known as baking soda, has been used for decades as a first line of defense against every kind of ‘acidic’ health problem – including cancer. Naturally, the question remains – is there any proof that baking soda is a defense against cancer or any other chronic dis-ease?
History has much to teach us about natural healthcare. In a booklet titled Arm & Hammer Baking Soda Medical Uses, published in 1924, Dr. Volney S. Cheney explains his clinical successes in using sodium bicarbonate to treat both the common cold and flu. His comments are actually quite remarkable …
“In 1918 and 1919, while fighting the ‘flu’ with the U. S. Public Health Service it was brought to my attention that rarely anyone who had been thoroughly alkalinized with bicarbonate of soda contracted the disease, and those who did contract it, if alkalinized early, would invariably have mild attacks.”
Sodium bicarbonate has been and still is used to make urine less acidic. This helps the kidneys get rid of uric acid and is used medically to prevent gout and kidney stones. Even athletes use sodium bicarbonate to improve endurance. In fact, cells that have enough bicarbonate consume more energy at rest – so they are better able to transport glucose and lactate.
Can baking soda help cancer patients heal naturally?
Sodium bicarbonate has a range of positive effects on breast cancer in animals, including increasing tumor pH, reducing lymph node involvement, and inhibiting metastases. Moreover, baking soda has been demonstrated to suppress cancerous growths, regulate the pH balance of cells and tissues, and elevate cell voltage.
By improving oxygen levels, baking soda can help prevent the development of cancer and even reverse malignant cells back to a healthy state. Weak cancer patients are often advised to take sodium bicarbonate, as it can help to improve muscle cell function after only a few days of treatment.
How does baking soda prevent cellular damage?
The pH level of the fluids within our bodies plays a critical role in the functioning of every cell. When the body becomes chronically over-acidic, it starts to corrode tissue, which can ultimately disrupt all cellular activities and functions. In short, over-acidity can interfere with life itself and is considered to be one of the fundamental causes of cancer.
Every cell in our bodies requires oxygen to thrive and remain healthy. When the pH level is low, there is less oxygen available for the cells to use. This phenomenon is comparable to what happens when acid rain alters the chemistry of lakes; the fish in the lake suffocate because the oxygen has bound up with other molecules and is no longer available.
However, if the oxygen level is raised, the lake will come back to life. Similarly, by increasing the amount of oxygen available to the cells, the body can return to a state of health and vitality.
How does ‘alkalinity’ help to prevent disease?
Maintaining a healthy pH range requires making necessary changes to our lifestyle and diet, which will help protect us over the long term. Using sodium bicarbonate can provide a jumpstart toward increasing alkalinity and is a natural medicine that should be treated with respect. It’s important to keep in mind that if our pH levels deviate too far from the acceptable range, our risk for disease increases significantly.
For a long time, drinking bicarbonate of soda dissolved in water has been a popular remedy for a range of health issues, including arthritis, indigestion, heartburn, and infections. Traditionally, sodium bicarbonate has been used as an antacid.
It’s worth noting that our body produces its own bicarbonate thanks to the work of our pancreas. Bicarbonate helps to neutralize acids that come from the stomach, creating an environment that is conducive to the effectiveness of pancreatic enzymes.
A word of caution – before using baking soda
One of the precautions in using sodium bicarbonate is its sodium content, and it is thus advised for patients with high blood pressure to check with their experienced healthcare provider before trying this remedy. Sodium bicarbonate, along with citrate and phosphate salts, does not raise blood pressure to the extent that sodium chloride does.
Table salt is a refined salt containing about 97 to 99 percent sodium chloride. We know for a fact that processed (‘table’) salt does raise blood pressure in only those sensitive to it. But, obviously – hypertension is caused by much more than just the use of table salt.
A study on mineral water containing sodium bicarbonate confirmed the absence of any effect on elderly individuals’ blood pressure. But, as usual, consult with a trusted healthcare provider – to discover the safest way to use sodium bicarbonate – based on individual needs.
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Sources for this article include:
NIH.gov
DrSircus.com
DrSircus.com
MD-Health.com