The Acid In Your Stomach

New Zealand Listener, Volume 9, Issue 228, 5 November 1943, Page 18

The Acid In Your Stomach

(Written for "The Listener’ by DR.

MURIEL

BELL

Nutritionist to the

Health Department)

ILL it burn a hole in your carpet? That is the question, I don’t think it is at all likely, in spite of the fears that certain advertisements attempt to engender in you. Certainly, when the food (which we followed to swallowing-point in the last article) reaches the stomach, that wonderful organ pours out a juice which contains pepsin, rennin, and hydrochloric acid; the last-named is a dilute solution, however, whereas it takes a highly-con-centrated solution to burn a hole in your carpet. This same acid does a number of useful things-it sterilises bacteria, it assists the pepsin in the digestion of protein foods, it prevents destruction of certain vitamins, for example vitamins Bl and C, it helps to prepare iron for absorption, and in some way is associated with the prevention of pernicious anaemia as well as of ordinary anaemia. There is a belief that needs some modification or correction, and that is to the effect that the acid in the stomach stops the digestion of starch, and on that belief .is founded a cult for not eating starch and protein at the same meal. The facts of the matter are these, that the stomach has two portions, of which the lower one is constantly churning the food, while the upper portion is behaving like a hopper, constantly feeding in a little of the contents into the lower part. The upper one is merely keeping a grip on the food; and all the time, the digestion of starch is going on within it. Those of us who have worked in hospital laboratories can testify to the fact that starch digestion is going on while the food is in the stomach, for we have examined many specimens from people whose stomachs are normal. If the starch does not get caught by Charybdis, then it cannot escape Scylla; for there is another, more potent starchdigesting ferment waiting for it just ‘round the corner, in the duodenum. There are certain things which stimuate the flow of gastric juice. First and foremost, there is the thought, sight, smell and taste of appetising food (acid fruits in particular), and the attractiveness of the meal-table. In this connection, the words of Macbeth are very apt: "Let good digestion wait on appetite, and health on both." Next most important are certain food elements found in soup, and formed from the digestion of proteins like meat. On the other hand, fats tend to depress the secretion of gastric juice; while fatigue is definitely a depressant. The implications of these facts are that, if you need any stimulus other than appetite, good beginnings to a meal are soups and acid fruits. Conversely, if you wish to depress your production of gastric juice, avoid soups; or take your orange-juice well diluted with water, sipping it at intervals during the day. If you wish your meal to tide you over for several hours, let fat be one of its components. Or if you wish to stave off hunger, take a glass of milk.