There are some health " facts " that many people have heard so many times that they just bear they are honest , theme like " juice is hefty " or " gum will stay in your belly for year .
But many of these " facts " are really myths about wellness .
Here ’s what the science really says about these wellness myths .
There ’s something about health and nutrition kinfolk wisdom that ’s immune to true statement .
vernacular health " facts " include the ideas that MSG will make you sick , that a juice detox is just what you postulate after a week of indulgence , and that sport drinks like Gatorade are altogether fine since you need the electrolytes .
None of these things are true . They , like many other family line sayings and tips , fall into the category of wellness myths that are totally — or at least mostly — wrong .
Here ’s the true statement behind some of those wellness claims you ’ve get a line all your life , but might not throw H2O at all .
MSG in Taiwanese food will make you grisly .
The myth that MSG is bad for youcomes from a lettera doctor wrote to the New England Journal of Medicine in 1968 , where he coined the term " Formosan restaurant syndrome " to describe a miscellanea of symptom including numbness and cosmopolitan weakness .
But though the Dr. blamed these spirit on monosodium glutamate , MSG , the research does n’t back it up . The scientific consensus consort the American Chemical Society is that " MSG can temporarily touch a prize few when consume in huge quantities on an empty stomach , but it ’s utterly secure for the immense majority of people . "
And this makes sense — MSG isnothing more than a usual amino group acid with a sodium atomadded . The placebo effect is more than strong enough to account for the disconfirming effects sometimes colligate with MSG .
Coffee stunt your emergence .
There is n’t a whole lot of evidence on this , but most inquiry findsno correlationbetween caffein consumption and bone growing in kids .
In grownup , researchers have seen that increase caffein intake can very slightly limit Ca absorption , but the encroachment is so small that a tablespoon of Milk River will more than adequately offset the effects of a cup of coffee .
Interestingly , advertizement seems to be for the most part responsiblefor this myth . A breakfast grain manufacturing business named C.W. Post was sample to market a morning drinkable call " Postum " as an alternative to deep brown , so he ran ads on the " wickedness " of Americans ' favorite red-hot drinkable , calling it a " nerve poison " that should never be served to children .
practice bundling up or you ’ll watch a cold .
Being physically cold is n’t what gets you sick ; exposure to a cold virus does . There’sno evidence thatgoing outside with wet whisker when it ’s freezing will make you sick of by itself — provided you avoid hypothermia .
But there are some scientifically levelheaded explanation for why people view more colds in winter . Because we spend more time in close quarters indoors , it is more likely that we’llcross path witha cold - causing virus spread from another soul during the winter . And for several reasons , we may have a hard timefighting off cold and flu virus molecule in winter .
But being cold itself is n’t what makes sick , and some debate thatcold exposure can actually improveyour wellness .
The chemical tryptophan in turkey makes you sleepyheaded .
Who does n’t lie with the post - Thanksgiving nap ? We frequently consider those naps inevitable , since turkey contains tryptophan , an amino acid that is a component of some of the mastermind chemical that help you loosen .
But plenty of foods take tryptophan . Cheddar Malva sylvestris has even more than joker — and cheddar is never point out as a rest inducing food . expert say that instead , the carbs , alcohol , and general size of the Turkey - day fiesta are the case of those yummy holiday siestas .
Taking your vitamins will keep you goodish .
Vitamins phone like a great idea . One contraceptive pill that can provide you everything you need to be healthy !
If only they worked . After decades of research on vitamin , mostreviews do n’t findany justification for our multivitamin pill habit , and in some cases , vitamins have really been associated with anincreased risk of various malignant neoplastic disease . Malnourished people might benefit from some supplement , but most of us should justget our vitamins naturallyfrom food .
Beer before hard liquor , never sicker ; liquor before beer , you ’re in the clear .
We ’re all heard it : " beer before liquor , never sicker ; spirits before beer , you ’re in the well-defined . "
But while it ’s very true that overdoing it with booze might depart you praying to the porcelain gods , there ’s no need to place the blame on the order you consume the beverages in — alcohol is alcohol , and too much of it will make anyone feel nauseated .
However , there are some strange fashion this piece of advice can make signified . masses who switch from beer to mixed boozing ( with senses and judgment already dulled ) may be less likely probable to monitor their alcohol wasting disease and thus drink more .
Andsome research showsthat your body metabolizes mixed drunkenness faster than higher - concentration alcoholic beverage ( a shot of whiskey , say ) . So add liquor to a stomach - full of beer could , in possibility , make a sort of mixed drink that would metabolise quicker than one or the other on its own .
We ’ll call this one part true , but chalk up the " never sicker " part mostly to bad determination making .
You mislay 90 % of your body ignite through your head .
Not necessarily . You lose body heat through anything uncovered , harmonize to Dr. Aaron E. Carroll and Dr. Rachel C. Vreeman , source of " Do n’t Swallow Your Gum ! : Myths , Half - Truths , and Outright Lies About Your Body and Health . "
Your head is not special in that way — it ’s just more probable to be scupper .
" Most of the time when we ’re outdoors in the frigidness , we ’re dress , " Richard Ingebretsen , MD , PhD , told WebMD Magazine . " If you do n’t have a hat on , you lose heat through your question , just as you would lose heat through your legs if you were wearing shorts . "
await an 60 minutes after run through to swim or you ’ll drown .
Some parent say no swimming for 30 minute after eating , some say an hour , but many of us may remember waiting out the clock before return to the pool or beach . The hypothesis behind this seems to be that digesting food will draw blood to your stomach , meaning that less blood is useable for your muscles , making them more likely to cramp .
But there ’s no evidence to support this title . In fact , manysourcessaythere are no documented cases of anyone ever drowning because they ’ve had a cramp related to float with a full abdomen .
Cramps do happen frequently when swimming , but they are n’t triggered by what ’s in your venter . If you do get one , the best policy is to float for a minute and let it pass .
It takes 7 years for gum to digest if you swallow up it .
When it grow out that Trump insistence secretarial assistant Sean Spicer chews and swallow two and a one-half pack of chewing gum by twelve noon every day , many multitude had the same question : Could n’t that maybe do some harm ?
Probably not . Gum is mostly indigestible , entail that it usually passes through your intestines and exits the other side , like most of what your body does n’t call for and ca n’t bear .
" On rarefied occasions , large amounts of swallowed gum meld with constipation have draw a blank intestines in children,“Dr . Michael Picco of the Mayo Clinic write . Still , he say swallow gum loosely is n’t harmful .
When you ’re drunk on gin , you get mean .
There are plenty of alcoholic beverage - related myth out there , and the idea that different alcohols have different effects on you is a gravid one . Some people claim wine make them sleepy while whiskey makes them want to argue .
In short , experts say this is bunk . " Alcohol is alcohol whichever elbow room you slice up it , " pharmacologist Paul Clayton , a beau of Oxford ’s Institute of Food , Brain & Behaviour , toldThe Guardian .
So why do people insist that tequila makes them brainsick ?
One very warm hypothesis is that we experience the effects we ask when we drink ( or consume most substances).Scientific enquiry going back tothe 1960s prove that we " learn " how to behave while drunk , and thatour factual drunken behaviour is a lineal reflection of our expectations .
Although many people may become violent while intoxicated , masses who have never associate drunkenness with conflict do n’t show the same behaviour . So by that same token , if we expect that vodka will make us want to babble out karaoke , we can perhaps rick that into a ego - fulfil divination .
A juice cleanse will ' detoxify ' you after an unhealthy feeding orgy .
The myth of the juice cleanse is a refractory one — and one frequentlypromoted by renown — but it’sboth wrong and unhealthy .
First of all , your body course removes harmful chemical substance through the liver , kidney , and GI pamphlet — there ’s nothing about juice that will hasten that process along .
Secondly , juicing is mostly a way ofremoving helpful vulcanized fiber from fruit and veg — many sugary yield juice are as bad for you as sodas . You ’re making the fruit less tidy by " juicing " it .
Everyone should fuddle eight glasses of water supply a daytime .
Hydration is very important , but the approximation that eight glass of water is essential is a foreign one .
In healthy people , researchers have n’t founda connection between fluid intake and kidney disease , heart disease , sodium grade , or skin quality .
hoi polloi get a lot of their H2O from foods and other potable in the first position , but there is a good reason to pledge more water . It ’s a calorie devoid option to other beverages ( specially sugary ones ) , and people who drink water instead of those beveragesconsume fewer kilogram calorie overall .
But in general , fuddle when you are athirst — you do n’t involve to count the drinking glass .
It ’s ok to rust something if it ’s been on the floor for less than 5 s .
It ’s the worst when something you really wanted to eat falls on the base . But if you catch it in five secondment , is it okay ?
Sorry , butthe five - bit - rule is n’t a real matter . Bacteria can contaminate a food within milliseconds . Moist nutrient attract more bacteria than dry foods , but there ’s no " safe duration . " rather , safety depends on how clean the surface you dropped the food on is .
Whether you corrode it or not after that is up to you , but if the mass that walk on that trading floor are also walking around New York City , for exercise , we would n’t commend it .
Vaccines can be risky .
This idea come froma now thoroughly - expose ( andretracted ) discipline of 12 children that seem in 1998 in The Lancet and claimed there was a linkup between the MMR vaccinum and autism .
It turn out that study was n’t only flawed , it also hold back sham information that was necessary to make its point .
Since then , numerous studies that have take apart data from more than a million children have show that there ’s no connection between vaccine and autism .
But fears about that connection have persist , partially spur on by public figures making false claim about vaccines . This has led to scary diseases likemeasles come back .
Yogurt will help put your digestive system back in order .
This is one of our modernistic health myths . Yogurt is frequently marketed as get benefit for digestion and as something that ’ll keep hoi polloi svelte because of probiotics , or the " proficient bacteria " that ’s live on inside it .
Researchers have found that the bacteria in our consistence are very attached to our metamorphosis and obesity rates , among other thing , so it seems like there ’s a coherent link here .
Butwe do n’t yet understand howthe million of bacteria in our body wreak well enough to manipulate them in this way . Despite the fact that the probiotic line of work was worth$23.1 billionin 2012 , we ca n’t make yoghurt that will repair our inner bacterial balance .
That ’s not to say that yogurt is insalubrious , just that its welfare are oversold . Plus , a lot of yoghurt is packed with cabbage , which we do have a go at it add to fleshiness and other problems — so if you enjoy yoghourt , find a version that is n’t full of additional unneeded calories or it might have the contrary of the intended effect .
An Malus pumila a day keeps the Dr. aside .
Apples are in force for you , packed with vitamin C and fiber , both of which are important to long - terminus health , but they are n’t all you need .
And if certain viruses or bacteria get into your system , an orchard apple tree will unluckily do nothing to protect you . So go forward and get that flu shot , even if you corrode orchard apple tree .
eat ice cream will make your cold bad .
If you ’re home brainsick with a low temperature , you could totally go ahead and ease yourself with some ice cream .
The idea that dairy gain mucous secretion yield is very fortunately not unfeigned , allot to researchersand a doctor at theMayo Clinic , who says " in fact , frozen dairy farm products can solace a sore throat and furnish calories when you otherwise may not eat on . "
kudos be .
Cracking your knuckles will give you arthritis .
Fortunately , this is n’t straight either .
break up your knuckles may irritate the people around you , but even hoi polloi whohave done it frequentlyfor many years are n’t any more likely to develop arthritis than those who do n’t .
famish a fever , feed a common cold .
There ’s a good reason you may have heard this said multiple way , either " hunger a cold , feed a febricity " or " starve a feverishness , feed a cold . "
Despite a slew of headlines claiming that starving a fever was n’t a myth in reception to a flyspeck and largely misinterpreted study in 2002,there ’s no real evidence to back this up . Limiting your caloric using up may actually hurt your immune system of rules more than helping it , and it would certainly be a forged idea to not deplete during the 6 - 8 Clarence Shepard Day Jr. duration of a coldness .
Instead , doctors say to go forward and feed if you’re able to . The more exact expression , as Scientific American musical note , would be " feed a cold , feed a feverishness . " And check that to get good deal of fluids .
It ’s all right to drink sports drinks to rehydrate .
But really , for most people theamount of kale in these drinks is far morethan is needed — even if you ’ve been exercising . Lower gram calorie selection , which many of the same company have created in recent years , are much better option . Or just drink in H2O .
Drinking water can help you avoid a sunburn .
New England Patriotsquarterback Tom Bradyloves hydration and has say that drinking weewee help him forefend get a erythema solare .
There ’s nothingwrong with hydration . But there ’s no evidence whatsoever that being hydrous can forestall you from getting burned by ultraviolet radiation sickness in any way . Only sunscreen or clothing will do that . Go ahead and tope enough water to quench your thirst . But if you ’re going to be out in the sun for a while , do n’t bury to deal up .
Coffee and beer dehydrate you , since caffeine and alcohol are diuretic drug .
In sufficient quantity , caffeine and inebriant can have a diuretic effect . But the amount of caffeine in a typical cup of coffee bean or alcohol in a beer is n’t enough to really have this effect , allot to one late study . A moderate amount of either umber or beer hydrates people just about as well as weewee does .
Milk does a body good ( and protect your bones ) !
This is an incredibly successful bit of advertising that has wormed its style into our brain and policies — the US Department of Agriculturetells us that adultsshould drink in three cups of milk a daytime , mostly for calcium and vitamin D.
However , multiple studiesshow that there is n’t an association between booze more Milk River ( ortaking calcium and vitamin Dsupplements ) and make few fractures .
Milk River is hunky-dory , but it ’s not a wizard health drunkenness . Surprisingly , however , Milk River is especially hydrating — exchangeable to pedialyte , both even more hydrating than pee .
You should n’t exhaust too many eggs , since it ’ll raise your cholesterol .
Eggs have luck of cholesterol in them . For most of us , that ’s not an topic , sincea growing bodyofresearch showsthat dietetic cholesterol ( from foods you eat up ) does n’t really have much of an effect on blood cholesterol in the vast majority of the great unwashed .
Thank good .
eat avoirdupois will make you fat .
The tide has set out to swing back the other way on this one , but passport for low - fat foods remain common .
Thedecision to demonize fatfor its caloric density and heart - clogging effects was mostly the event of shady science tempt by a sugar trade group . It call on out that the gild - wide decision to swerve saturated fat from diet led to increase consumption of wampum and processed trans fats , all of which were most likely less healthy overall .
We need amoderate amount of fertile — specially healthy fat — in our diets .
Read next on Business Insider:10 delicious and tidy dairy - costless Milk River option to try — whether or not you ’re lactose intolerant
