Don’t Make Toxic Exposure Worse by Using Bogus and Potentially Harmful “Detox” Products:
You can’t turn on the TV or browse social media these days without hearing about the latest “detox” craze and how you should purge toxins from your liver and body. For people who have been exposed to toxins through the environment, work or some other means, the promises of a “cleanse” that can make your body healthy again can be alluring. But do these detox products really help? Or can they hurt you even more?
How the Liver Functions
The liver is the largest organ in your body and holds about a pint of blood at any given time. That’s about 1/13th of your blood. The liver performs more than 500 metabolic functions in the body and helps convert carbohydrates, fat and proteins in your food into energy and substances the body can use. It also performs important functions in controlling blood sugar and glucose levels, as well as regulating blood clotting.The liver also acts as a filter for both by-products of nutrients that it breaks down and for toxins that enter the blood like alcohol, medications or other toxic substances. As nutrient rich blood flows into the liver from the digestive organs, the liver breaks them down so the body can use the nutrients and removes harmful substances or by-products. The liver also breaks down old red blood cells and converts ammonia, a naturally occurring by-product of metabolizing proteins, into urea. The liver secretes bile, which carries these harmful substances from the liver into the bowel, so they can pass out of the body.
Toxins Introduced into the Body Through Chemical Exposure
Toxic chemicals can be inhaled, injected, swallowed or taken in through skin exposure. For example:
- A nozzle comes loose on an assembly line and blasts an organic solvent onto a line worker. The solvent seeps through his clothes and causes exposure via the skin.
- Welding fumes enter the ventilation system of an office building and sicken workers with acute chemical poisoning.
- Dust from an abrasive cleaning process at a manufacturing plant contains lead, mercury and other heavy elements, which, over time, accumulate in the bodies of factory workers.
- After working with toxic reagents in the lab, a medical worker forgets to wash her hands before taking a break in the cafeteria and accidentally contaminates food with toxic compounds, which others later unknowingly ingest.
There are countless ways toxins can find their way into our systems, in other words. But aside from the liver, can other simple processes get rid of them?
What Detox Products Promise
So-called “detox” products promise to remove harmful toxins from the body and “cleanse” the liver and bowels. Marketing pitches for intestinal detox, food detox, detox diets and others, all seem to imply that food additives, GMOs, medications and other substances are stored in our body and cause illness. But this is far from the truth.The body simply doesn’t store harmful substances in the kidneys, digestive system or liver. Rather, those organs function as a natural detoxification process, removing harmful substances and passing them through the body as efficiently as possible. If your organs have been harmed by toxic or repeated exposure to harmful substances, there is no scientific evidence that a cleanse or detox will help. In fact, detox diets and products could further disrupt your body’s ability to function. If you are feeling fatigue or having changes in bowel function, you should see your doctor instead of looking to the latest detox craze.If you think you’ve been harmed by toxic exposure, the professionals at the Madeksho Law Firm may be able to help. For a FREE consultation, call us at 1-888-910-6376, or contact us here.
