A lot of ifs in this study, but... if it holds up, then a really, really cheap medicine. A study by researchers at Augusta University (in Georgia) found that drinking a little baking soda (sodium bicarbonate or NaHCO3 ) with water tells the spleen to go easy on the immune response. In other words, ingesting the baking soda promotes an anti-inflammatory response by the spleen ("activates splenic anti-inflammatory pathways") - which the researchers found in both rats and humans.
The researchers thought this could mean that perhaps some day drinking a little baking soda each day could lower the body's inflammation in kidney disease and autoimmune diseases like rheumatoid arthritis. How much baking soda? The researchers tested 2 g of NaHCO3 (less than 1/2 teaspoon) dissolved in 250 ml of bottled water in a small group of healthy adults. More studies need to be done. From Science Daily:
Drinking baking soda could be an inexpensive, safe way to combat autoimmune disease
A daily dose of baking soda may help reduce the destructive inflammation of autoimmune diseases like rheumatoid arthritis, scientists say. They have some of the first evidence of how the cheap, over-the-counter antacid can encourage our spleen to promote instead an anti-inflammatory environment that could be therapeutic in the face of inflammatory disease, Medical College of Georgia scientists report in the Journal of Immunology. ...continue reading "Drinking Baking Soda as a Medical Treatment?"