Is Citric Acid A Bad Bad Boy?

Johhny Tazzle

Member
Joined
Aug 20, 2017
Messages
107
U can remember the interview with Dr. Peat where he lists citric acid and ascorbic acid as the 2nd worst toxin in our food supply, anybody have any other infor on citric acid as its in so many things, luckily its not in coke, i remember danny roddy saying it messes with his digestion, i can also attest to that.
 

fradon

Member
Joined
Sep 23, 2017
Messages
605
U can remember the interview with Dr. Peat where he lists citric acid and ascorbic acid as the 2nd worst toxin in our food supply, anybody have any other infor on citric acid as its in so many things, luckily its not in coke, i remember danny roddy saying it messes with his digestion, i can also attest to that.
most citric acid in product is lab made and contains MSG or free glutamate.
 

Lurker

Member
Joined
Jul 11, 2017
Messages
317
Where did Ray Peat mention ascorbic acid as being toxic?

Herb Doctors: The Ten Most Toxic Things In Our Foodnew
RAY PEAT: At that time, it was very expensive to make. And the pills on sale were only 50 mg. Several years later they developed new ways of manufacturing it. One of the processes Linus Pauling described as the lead room for making sulfuric acid which is then – the sulfuric acid is slightly contaminated with lead and other heavy metals. Then the cornstarch is processed, oxidized with this industrial sulfuric acid and ends up as ascorbic acid containing quite a bit of heavy metal. And with these new methods, I found that when people were taking 500 or 1,000 mg, they would often develop cold symptoms when they took it rather than when they didn't take it. And it apparently is irritating enough to the intestines that it causes endotoxin absorption and inflammation of the nose and throat and chest membrane. And citric acid is manufactured by very similar methods to ascorbic acid. And they really shouldn't be considered to have anything to do with the natural ascorbic acid or citric acid. The person who can get very sick on 2 mg of synthetic ascorbic acid can eat 4,000 mg of natural ascorbic acid with no reaction at all.
 

shepherdgirl

Member
Joined
Dec 7, 2015
Messages
707
I have been looking for CA that's not contaminated with mercury. Mountain Rose Herbs sells really expensive CA that they claim has less than 3ppm heavy metals - not sure what "heavy metals" means here, and i haven't gotten around to asking them yet, but so far that's the only possibility I have found.
 

Kartoffel

Member
Joined
Sep 29, 2017
Messages
1,199
Whenever I eat candy containing citric acid my digestion will be bad for several days and I will sneeze and get a blocked nose. Synthetic citric acid is definitely a powerful irritant.
 
OP
Johhny Tazzle

Johhny Tazzle

Member
Joined
Aug 20, 2017
Messages
107
Thanks kartoffel, you would never think something as seemingly insignificant could have such a profound effect. Been following dr. Peat for over 6 years and im just starting to avoid it, i wish dr. Peat had more info on it.
 

yerrag

Member
Joined
Mar 29, 2016
Messages
10,883
Location
Manila

Ray's comment is unfortunate. With it, ascorbic acid becomes taboo, or cast in doubt, shunned, and marginalized as a substance that can be of benefit to our health. Not that what he says isn't true, but a good substance is equated with the poor and toxic manufacturing processes that robs it of its usefulness. But do all ascorbic acid deserve to be cast in such bad light? What about Quali-C, made in Scotland, non-GMO? Is it also tainted with lead? If the objection is about lead in the inferior grades of ascorbic acid commonly sold, then call it what it is, and then offer some suggestions on what to look for in a good ascorbic acid, and where one can find it. Not doing so leaves a large element of doubt on the substance itself, and I believe this has caused this forum and its members to put little attention to a substance that could be helpful in many instances.

To be cast in the same vein as those gums, it isn't fair. Those gums are inherently harmful, regardless of the manfacturing process used. But vitamin C, is it inherently harmful at all? But it is classed as such for all intents and purposes. Only because the manufacturing process used produced a product that is tainted with lead.

This is a classic case of throwing the baby away with the bath water.
 
Joined
Feb 26, 2018
Messages
988
This is a classic case of throwing the baby away with the bath water.

I'll go out on a limb and say that I think there are probably many cases where various vitamins, sports drinks etc are perceived as useful by the consumer purely because of the effect of citrate content rather than the effect of the actual 'active' content.

It would be a very interesting study to see placebo / vs placebo+citrate / vs supplement that contains mainly citrate. But there is no money in marketing citrate as healthy, and certainly a lot of it is contaminated as most staple industrial products are.
 
Last edited:

yerrag

Member
Joined
Mar 29, 2016
Messages
10,883
Location
Manila
I just experienced really bad results from 5 months of using magnesium chloride. Chloride in the therapeutic dose I was taking was too much, and I ended up with poorer health. My metabolism got lower, and I got more susceptible to allergies. It's because the chloride turn into HCl, a powerful acid, and this acid load, accumulated over time, makes the lungs and kidneys work overtime to compensate with. It also reduces CO2 in the blood, and affects tissue oxygenation, and lowers metabolism. Lowered metabolism makes the body weaker.

I'm saying this because I used magnesium chloride over magnesium citrate. And the reason for not using magnesium citrate was because Ray says that most citrate is contaminated with lead. I'm not blaming Ray, but saying that the reason citrate isn't good is because it is tainted with the label "lead toxic," not because uncontaminated citric acid is bad.

In fact, citric acid is good. Magnesium citrate is better than magnesium chloride. Citrate is a weak organic acid. Absorbed into the blood stream, its effect on blood pH is minimal, unlike that of chloride.

I have Calm's magnesium citrate. I don't know how much lead is in it. I don't know if I should use it. Is there any other reason citrate or citric acid is bad?

I don't have to take magnesium citrate. There are other magnesium salts out there.
 
Joined
Feb 26, 2018
Messages
988
@yerrag

I think citrate is labeled bad simply because of contamination issues. I am not clear on how contaminated it all is. My impression is there are a handful of big plants where most of it all comes from, apparently some of the older plants have poor methods of chemical refining that can leave trace toxic metals. There is also some issue over if mold contamination is present, since it is a product of mold. As is the case with most of these issues on industrial food commodities and their purity, I do not know how legitimate the concerns are. The type of informative content I find is usually from alternative health sites like mercola.com that have an agenda to sell you something "pure" at a giant mark-up. I have not been able to find a large unbiased assay on the gravity of this, or most things like this. While I do not disagree that there can be some level of impurity, I have to decide frequently between sheltering myself from all the potential impurities vs. letting my guard down to reap the known benefits from something. I think a good example of this is trying to pick one path of which would be healthier: eating no fruit or vegetables, eating all you want of grown with pesticide / gmo etc fruit and vegetables, only eating occasionally the most pure organic heirloom perfectly ripe / just picked / local fruit and vegetables. In this case, I say **** it - get the gmo and pesticide stuff, because the benefits outweigh the risks - and my budget prevents me from affording enough of the pure stuff, and I don't think going without any is at all rational.
 
Last edited:

TreasureVibe

Member
Joined
Jul 3, 2016
Messages
1,941
I just experienced really bad results from 5 months of using magnesium chloride. Chloride in the therapeutic dose I was taking was too much, and I ended up with poorer health. My metabolism got lower, and I got more susceptible to allergies. It's because the chloride turn into HCl, a powerful acid, and this acid load, accumulated over time, makes the lungs and kidneys work overtime to compensate with. It also reduces CO2 in the blood, and affects tissue oxygenation, and lowers metabolism. Lowered metabolism makes the body weaker.

I'm saying this because I used magnesium chloride over magnesium citrate. And the reason for not using magnesium citrate was because Ray says that most citrate is contaminated with lead. I'm not blaming Ray, but saying that the reason citrate isn't good is because it is tainted with the label "lead toxic," not because uncontaminated citric acid is bad.

In fact, citric acid is good. Magnesium citrate is better than magnesium chloride. Citrate is a weak organic acid. Absorbed into the blood stream, its effect on blood pH is minimal, unlike that of chloride.

I have Calm's magnesium citrate. I don't know how much lead is in it. I don't know if I should use it. Is there any other reason citrate or citric acid is bad?

I don't have to take magnesium citrate. There are other magnesium salts out there.
Citric acid causes calcium excretion according to Ray Peat. Btw I also suffer(ed) from hyperchloremia/chloride toxicity. What did you do to counter it?
 

Mufasa

Member
Joined
Jun 10, 2016
Messages
624
What about orange juice then? Isn't that very high in citric acid and vitamin C?
 

yerrag

Member
Joined
Mar 29, 2016
Messages
10,883
Location
Manila
@yerrag

I think citrate is labeled bad simply because of contamination issues. I am not clear on how contaminated it all is. My impression is there are a handful of big plants where most of it all comes from, apparently some of the older plants have poor methods of chemical refining that can leave trace toxic metals. There is also some issue over if mold contamination is present, since it is a product of mold. As is the case with most of these issues on industrial food commodities and their purity, I do not know how legitimate the concerns are. The type of informative content I find is usually from alternative health sites like mercola.com that have an agenda to sell you something "pure" at a giant mark-up. I have not been able to find a large unbiased assay on the gravity of this, or most things like this. While I do not disagree that there can be some level of impurity, I have to decide frequently between sheltering myself from all the potential impurities vs. letting my guard down to reap the known benefits from something. I think a good example of this is trying to pick one path of which would be healthier: eating no fruit or vegetables, eating all you want of grown with pesticide / gmo etc fruit and vegetables, only eating occasionally the most pure organic heirloom perfectly ripe / just picked / local fruit and vegetables. In this case, I say **** it - get the gmo and pesticide stuff, because the benefits outweigh the risks - and my budget prevents me from affording enough of the pure stuff, and I don't think going without any is at all rational.

Yeah, I don't know if it's true that citric acid just metabolizes into carbon dioxide and water. If so, what's the harm?

I keep doing a Google search on "citric acid calcium urine" and can't come across anything that says citric acid increases calcium excretion in urine. Could someone with access to Ray Peat ask him for some references?

I get some studies that say citric acid reduces the formation of kidney stones. So this is a good thing, isn't it?

I just can't find many bad things about citric acid other than lead contamination from Ray.

But Ray Peat in Phosphate, activation, and aging. says Excessive citric acid, for example, might activate dormant cancer cells (Havard, et al., 2011), and has been associated with malignancy (Blüml, et al., 2011). But again, what is excessive?
Citric acid causes calcium excretion according to Ray Peat. Btw I also suffer(ed) from hyperchloremia/chloride toxicity. What did you do to counter it?

My body just kept urinating out the chlorine, which kept me going to the toilet night and day. I lost a lot of sleep because of it, waking up 4x each night. Apparently, the kidney makes ammonia, and the ammonium ion pairs with chlorine in the kidney and gets excreted as ammonium chloride. But this is "make work" on the kidney. I don't know if I have to, but I'm just now taking additional baking soda each day (about 3g a day) and will monitor my urine pH and stop when it reaches 7.5

I stopped taking magnesium chloride and will go into making my own mag bicarbonate, once I get around to doing it, which I have delayed for so long.
 

yerrag

Member
Joined
Mar 29, 2016
Messages
10,883
Location
Manila
I'm now conflicted about magnesium citrate. On one hand, Ray Peat says the citrate will cause calcium excretion through urine. @Mito has reminded me of this. But lately, @Amazoniac has shown some references that show calcium excretion to be a good thing, being that citrate prevents calcium oxalate stones from forming (in the urine bladder).

I'm also having doubts about whether citric acid intake (thru supps as well as citrus fruits) will lead to acidic blood/ecf. Amazoniac has also provided references that state that citric acid metabolizes to bicarbonate in the liver, and that the hydrogen positive ion simply neutralizes the bicarbonate, leaving a neutral effect on body fluids. And citrate, on the other hand, makes the body more alkaline.

I suppose that if there's concern about lead contamination in industrial citric acid, one could just resort to eating or drinking the juice of citrus fruits. The more sour a fruit is, the more it contains citric acid. But since citrates have an alkaline effect while citric acid has a neutral effect, it would help to add bicarbonate to the juice to convert the citric acid to a citrate. That can be done with baking soda. But I think it's possible also to do that with magnesium bicarbonate or potassium bicarbonate (or for that matter magnesium carbonate or potassium carbonate).
 

Similar threads

Back
Top Bottom