Balance is vitally important to ensuring a healthy body, and your body will go to great lengths to ensure that it has the ideal conditions to prosper.

One of the biggest examples of how it does this is in the form of its acid-base balance or the balance between the different acids and alkalines (or bases) in your body.

By being aware of what you eat and drink, and using water ionisers to help retain a balance can help your body to stay healthy and avoid oxidation and other signs of ageing.

However, eating certain types of food, specifically spicy meals and drinks that produce acid, can have a negative effect on your blood pH level and leave you vulnerable to illness.

Here is why too many acidic foods and drinks can be bad for you.

What Is The Right Balance?

The acid-alkaline balance is measured using the pH scale, which is a scale of acidity to alkalinity measured from 0 to 14.

The extreme ends of the spectrum are both highly dangerous, as a liquid with a pH close to zero would have the same acidity as battery acid and be as lethal if consumed, whilst a pH of 14 is reserved for lye, an ingredient in oven cleaners and drain openers.

The middle of the scale is reserved for “pure” water, which is often distilled to ensure a PH balance, and most foods are between 3 (for particularly strong orange juices) to around 9.

Whilst the pH levels of the body vary, blood tends to be slightly alkaline (between 7.36 and 7.44), and your kidneys will work to neutralise acids in the body, usually by using sodium bicarbonate, the key ingredient of baking soda with a pH of around 9.

What Diseases Can Be Caused By Too Much Acid?

The most dangerous disease that is the result of too much acid in the body is acidosis, which can be either metabolic or respiratory in nature.

Metabolic acidosis is when your kidneys cannot remove acid from your body, which is most often caused by too much lactic acid (the acid that builds up when you exercise hard) building up that your kidneys cannot remove.

However, it can also be caused by not having enough alkalines in your body, which is usually caused by sickness, as your body loses sodium bicarbonate when you vomit.

Outside of extreme examples, metabolic waste can also cause people to be more vulnerable to diseases, as the more foods that leave behind acidic metabolic waste can have a negative effect on your body.

However, the opposite is also the case, and this is the way to help your body manage its pH level.

How Do You Maintain The Right Balance?

Foods that leave behind alkaline minerals such as potassium, magnesium and calcium can be helpful to help maintain a healthy body.

These include a lot of superfoods, such as spinach, broccoli, kale, sea vegetables and sprouted beans.

Interestingly, lemons, limes and tomatoes, despite being citric in nature, have a high level of alkaline minerals and can be beneficial to the body.