Are there many detox diets , even the coal one ?

In fact, we too have already talked about the detox diet on another page of this site .

What, then, is the charcoal detox diet?

Let’s see it together.

When I heard about this, I was a little perplexed.

In fact, however, it is a very fashionable thing, especially one reads very often in the newspapers or on the net.

And I’ve also read about people who got a bad stomach ache. So obviously I did some research.

My first instinct when I heard people ingest coal was: Are you crazy?

Coal is good for barbecuing, not for eating it. And doesn’t it taste awful?

But then I realized this is activated carbon .

The main idea is that activated carbon has greater absorption, and that this can help absorb poisons . It is important to note that this type of absorption arises from a kind of magnet effect of coal that makes any type of poison and toxins attach to itself, in fact it is used as a gastric lavage in case of real poisoning.

Now from here there are those who have taken the idea of ​​using activated carbon as a food supplement, since it is good for you. But let’s see specifically what it is.

The origins of coal as a detoxifier

In short, activated carbon is used in the treatment, in the emergency room , of different types of intoxication, including overdose. It does not prevent poisons from being absorbed by the body but binds to poisons that have been released into the body, for example we can talk about drugs that are still in the digestive tract and that have not yet been absorbed.

Doctors determine the dosage and administer the charcoal through various means, including tubes through the nose, mouth, or both. This is used in a hospital setting and therefore the patient is highly monitored. If the administration of activated charcoal does not result in a high enough reduction of the venom, the patient can undergo dialysis to remove the venom directly from the blood.

Studies show that activated charcoal is an effective sorbent of poison that is still in the body shortly after ingestion, but ineffective if the poison or drugs have been in the system longer.

Okay, it makes sense, so when administered in the hospital for overdose or similar poisoning activated charcoal can be effective. The reasoning behind the diet, then, is that coal can detoxify the various poisons that circulate in our body. Which doesn’t make much sense, since if we ingest some food substance, whether it’s good or bad, it gets absorbed by our body in a fairly short time. Food doesn’t just stay there in our gut, it’s not like we can climb into a tent in the meantime!

So since charcoal is used as a detoxifier in the hospital, people have well thought of it as a nice marketing strategy as a detoxifier in diets.

The reason?

Well, the money, of course. Talking about coal as useful in case of poisoning is one thing, working on it in a diet is really not very credible.

What else is coal used for?

If you are thinking that activated carbon, with its ability to absorb chemicals, may have other uses, you would be right. In fact, there are a number of commercial and environmental uses of activated carbon that make me reconsider ingesting it.

For instance:

• Waste water treatment – Coal could be used in the water filter or similar filter. These carbon filters use activated carbon to remove contaminants and impurities with chemical absorption.
• Air Filtration – You may also have noticed that the air filters, the black ones, are filled with activated carbon. These filters, in fact, filter the air. They remove volatile organic compounds from the air and also eliminate odor.
• Hydrogen storage – the use of activated carbon is something new. One of the most interesting applications is that hydrogen, which is a gas at room temperature, is generally pressurized and stored as a liquid, so it is very cold. But research has shown that activated carbon can allow it to be stored at room temperature.

Now I don’t know about you, but none of these uses make me want to jump out of my chair and have a good feast of activated charcoal. Yes, I know, detox charcoal supplements come in a lot of nice little pills and have a variety of ingredients inside. But the key ingredient that is marketed is activated carbon. The same activated carbon that is used in water filters and the like.

Would you like to eat your water filter?

Side effects on the intestine

If you think that ingesting charcoal could affect your gut, you are absolutely right. Let’s face it, coal isn’t something people ingest for its nutritional qualities. And it is not digested or absorbed in the body. Therefore, it can lead to intestinal blockage .

Now, if you already suffer from intestinal obstruction or if you are a bit slow in that area, go easy on the coal.

Here are some other gastrointestinal side effects caused by ingesting activated charcoal:

Stomach pain and / or bloating
Diarrhea
Constipation
Vomiting

Side effects on metabolism

The problems we discussed above where activated charcoal can lead to intestinal blockage, we must also mention that this is why many activated charcoal supplements add sorbitol to their charcoal mix. Sorbitol is a sugar alcohol that acts as a laxative. However, sorbitol also has some metabolic side effects , including:

• Dehydration
• Shock
• Electrolyte changes
• Hypernatremia – or high blood sodium levels
• Hypomagnesemia – or abnormally low levels of magnesium in the blood

Sorbitol can also aggravate irritable bowel syndrome and other gastrointestinal problems, resulting in very severe stomach pain even with small amounts ingested. Since coal can aggravate stomach problems, if you have a sensitive stomach, it is best to avoid it.

Side effects on the blood

Going back to the hospital and the use of activated charcoal in detoxification cases, we must not forget that the dosage of activated charcoal for poison is closely monitored by doctors. But the wrong dosage can exacerbate the symptoms of variegated porphyria – a rare disease that affects around 1 in 300 people.

The fact is, many people have no symptoms of this disease, even though they have it. This is a good thing, if you don’t overdo it with activated charcoal. In this case an attack can be triggered and the condition can cause skin lesions, heavy blisters, and in the most serious cases possible neuromuscular damage .

While this is a rare side effect, I just wanted to point out that coal, even in this case, worsens the condition of our blood, it certainly does not improve it.

Breathing Side Effects

Side effects on breathing have to do with how activated charcoal is administered and most likely unless charcoal is inhaled there should be no problems in home and non-hospital use of charcoal itself. Regardless, to give you the more than complete picture, activated charcoal, when administered into the airway pathway, can lead to chronic lung disease .

The Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine published a study showing how activated charcoal can rapidly lead to respiratory failure. Quite scary, don’t you think?

How our body actually detoxifies itself

When I think of the words detox I always think of a miracle diet. As if following a diet plan for a couple of weeks were able to eliminate all the harmful elements that I have ingested or drank over the course of a lifetime. This is exactly the kind of thing people want to hear and it’s too good to be true. Nothing beats learning good eating habits, nothing.

In an article in the Guardian there is an interview with Edzard Ernst , professor emeritus of complementary medicine at the University of Exeter. And ok, I have a certain passion for Google too, I found that it is one of the 10 best universities that exist in the UK.

However, Dr. Ernst said: “There are two types of detoxification: one is highly respectable and the other is not. That respectable is the medical treatment of life threatening drug addicts. The other is the word being hijacked by business owners and charlatans about a bogus treatment that supposedly detoxifies the body of toxins you should have accumulated over the course of your life. “.

Ernst goes on to say: “If the toxins had accumulated in a way that the body could not excrete them, you would probably be dead or certainly in need of medical intervention. The healthy body has the kidneys, liver, skin, even lungs that are detoxifying us as we speak. There is no known way – certainly not through detoxification treatments – to do something that works perfectly in a healthy body. “

Now, when I read all this, I thought: I agree but these are very hard words!

The Huffington Post actually responded to the Guardian article and went deeper into what detox diets are that target ridding us of toxins. They point out that while the liver and kidneys and other organs rid us of many toxins in the body, these organs can become burdened over time and function poorly with inadequate nutrition or a poor diet.

In my opinion, most of the detox diets you see are bogus . But diets that are simply promoting healthy alternatives or trying to teach you to eat high-quality, nutritious foods work. They work in the sense that they provide adequate nutrition for the body so that it can do a better job.

Conclusions

Now we should talk about “common sense”. Isn’t that a funny term? Because it seems that what we call common sense is actually not common at all. Deep down, we know that eating healthy, sleeping well, and exercising in our lives is the best thing we can do for ourselves and our health. But it is difficult to change habits, we know it very well, it is useless to deny it.

In all these posts I have always tried to tell you about the things I believe in and the things that seem to me like fashion or marketing scams and I have always talked to you about how I believe that moderation is the basis of everything.

Research on activated charcoal and its role as a dietary supplement is still limited now. Most of the research is based on how it is used in medicine or industry, not as a supplement to a diet. My thought is clear: we are talking about an element that works like a magnet for poisons, it is used in cases of overdose and in my opinion these should be the cases in which to ingest it.

In addition to this it is useless for me to tell you to try a detox diet that allows you to obtain sufficient vitamins, minerals, macronutrients and with good body hydration that can allow your liver and kidneys to function at maximum performance. And that, above all, it will be the best basis for helping our organs to detoxify naturally, which happens every day.

A controversial post, I know, also quite hard!

Have you tried detox with activated charcoal? Have you encountered any problems?

Write it in the comments, I can’t wait to read them!