
By Jesica Salyer
What is Aloe Vera Juice?
The aloe vera plant is a succulent plant species from the genus Aloe. It grows abundantly in tropical climates and has been used for centuries as a medicinal plant.
Aloe vera juice is a gooey, thick liquid made from the flesh of the aloe vera plant leaf. It's commonly known to treat sunburns. But drinking this healthy elixir in juice form provides you with a number of other health benefits.
Aloe vera juice is made by crushing or grinding the entire leaf of the aloe vera plant, followed by various steps to purify and filter the liquid. With a mild, tolerable flavor, the juice mixes easily into smoothies and shakes. This makes aloe vera juice a practical whole food supplement.
What Are the Health Benefits of Drinking Aloe Vera Juice?
Here are nine reasons to drink pure, uncolored, low anthraquinone aloe vera juice.
1. Alkalinity
A body with an acidic pH is a breeding ground for disease. It's an atmosphere where illness thrives. Help keep your body balanced by eating and drinking alkaline foods and beverages such as aloe vera juice.
Other smart alkaline food choices include:
- leafy greens
- root vegetables
- legumes
- nuts and seeds
- fruits
2. Hydration
The aloe plant is very water-dense, so it's an ideal way to prevent or treat dehydration. Staying hydrated helps your body detox by providing a way for you to purge and flush out impurities. The juice also packs a hefty punch of nutrients that optimize your body's organ output.
This is crucial, because your kidneys and liver are largely responsible for the task of detoxifying your blood and producing urine. For this reason, you need to keep them healthy.
Recovery from heavy exercise also requires rehydration through the intake of extra fluids. Your body requires more fluids in order to flush and rid itself of the lactic acid buildup from exercising. Try aloe vera juice instead of coconut water after your next hard workout.
3. Liver function
When it comes to detoxing, healthy liver function is key.
Aloe vera juice is an excellent way to keep your liver healthy. That's because the liver functions best when the body is adequately nourished and hydrated. Aloe vera juice is ideal for the liver because it's hydrating and rich in phytonutrients.
4. For constipation
Drinking aloe vera juice helps increase the water content in your intestines. Research has shown a relationship between increasing the intestinal water content and the stimulation of peristalsis, which helps you pass stool normally.
If you're constipated or have problems with frequent constipation, try incorporating aloe vera juice into your daily routine. Aloe also helps normalize the healthy bacteria in your gut, keeping your healthy intestinal flora balanced.
5. For clear skin
Hydrating aloe vera juice may help reduce the frequency and appearance of acne. It may also help reduce skin conditions like psoriasis and dermatitis.
Aloe vera is a rich source of antioxidants and vitamins that may help protect your skin.
The important compounds in aloe vera have also been shown to neutralize the effects of ultraviolet (UV) radiation, repair your skin from existing UV damage, and help prevent fine lines and wrinkles.
6. Nutritious boost
Aloe vera juice is jam-packed with nutrients. Drinking it is an excellent way to make sure you don't become deficient. It contains important vitamins and minerals like vitamins B, C, E, and folic acid.
It also contains small amounts of:
Aloe vera is one of the only plant sources of vitamin B-12, too. This is excellent news for vegetarians and vegans.
Keeping your food and drink intake nutrient-rich is key in combating most preventable diseases.
7. Heartburn relief
Drinking aloe vera juice may give you relief when heartburn attacks. The compounds present in aloe vera juice help control secretion of acid in your stomach. The effects have even been shown to combat gastric ulcers and keep them from getting larger.
8. Digestive benefits
Aloe vera contains several enzymes known to help in the breakdown of sugars and fats and to keep your digestion running smoothly.
If your digestive system isn't operating optimally, you won't absorb all of the nutrients from the food you're eating. You have to keep your internal engine healthy in order to reap the benefits from your diet.
Aloe vera may help decrease irritation in the stomach and intestines. The juice may also help people with irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) and other inflammatory disorders of the intestines.
One 2013 study of 33 IBS patients found that aloe vera juice helped reduce the pain and discomfort of IBS. The study was not placebo-controlled, so more research is needed.
Aloe vera was also beneficial to people suffering from ulcerative colitis in an earlier double-blind, placebo-controlled study.
9. Beauty hacks
Keeping aloe vera juice on hand can also be good for a number of beauty and health needs.
Try using it for the following:
- makeup primer (apply before foundation)
- makeup remover
- sunburn soother
- lightweight moisturizer
- treatment for irritated scalp (mix in a few drops of peppermint oil)
What are the Side Effects of Drinking Aloe Vera Juice?
Decolorized (purified, low anthraquinone) whole leaf aloe vera is considered safe. A 2013 studyin mice fed various concentrations of purified aloe vera for three months showed no adverse effects at all from the juice.
Colored vs. decolorized aloe juice
On the other hand, nondecolorized, unpurified aloe vera juice can have unpleasant side effects, including diarrhea and cramping.
Diarrhea can lead to severe pain, dehydration, and electrolyte imbalances.
Researchers have concluded that the side effects caused by unpurified aloe vera juice are a result of the presence of anthraquinone, which is considered a laxative.
Though anthraquinone is an organic compound naturally found in the leaf of the aloe vera plant, it's considered toxic and should be avoided.
One 2013 study found that aloe vera whole-leaf extract increased the risk of colon adenomas (benign) and carcinomas (cancer) in rats. However, another study on rats that same year noted that purified and decolorized juice is a safer option when compared to colored aloe vera.
When shopping, look for the following statements on the label:
- purified
- decolorized
- organic
- safety tested
Drug Interactions With Aloe Vera Juice
Aloe juice has been shown to interact with certain medications. If you are taking any drug that is considered a substrate of Cytochrome P450 3A4 and CYP2D6, do not drink aloe vera juice. Aloe vera juice may increase the risk of side effects of these drugs.
Aloe may also add to the effects of sevoflurane, causing excessive bleeding during surgery. If you are taking sevoflurane, check with your doctor before drinking aloe juice.
How Much Sugar is in Aloe Vera Juice?
Unlike most juices, a 4-ounce serving of aloe vera juice contains no sugar and only a few calories. If you're watching your sugar intake, aloe vera juice is a healthy choice.
Where to Find Aloe Vera Juice
Aloe vera juice can be purchased online or in most health food markets. When shopping for aloe vera juice, it's important to consider the quality of the product.
Look for organic, pure, and 100 percent aloe juice. It's important to drink pure aloe vera juice rather than a blend that has fillers. Read the label carefully.
Next Steps
For a health boost, drink up to 8 ounces of aloe vera juice per day. You can pour it over ice, mix it in with your smoothie or favorite juice, or just drink it from the bottle.
Medically reviewed by Katherine Marengo, LDN, RD.
Reposted with permission from our media associate Healthline.
New fossils uncovered in Argentina may belong to one of the largest animals to have walked on Earth.
- Groundbreaking Fossil Shows Prehistoric 15-Foot Reptile Tried to ... ›
- Skull of Smallest Known Dinosaur Found in 99-Million-Year Old Amber ›
- Giant 'Toothed' Birds Flew Over Antarctica 40 Million Years Ago ... ›
- World's Second-Largest Egg Found in Antarctica Probably Hatched ... ›
EcoWatch Daily Newsletter
A federal court on Tuesday struck down the Trump administration's rollback of the Obama-era Clean Power Plan regulating greenhouse gas emissions from power plants.
- Pruitt Guts the Clean Power Plan: How Weak Will the New EPA ... ›
- It's Official: Trump Administration to Repeal Clean Power Plan ... ›
- 'Deadly' Clean Power Plan Replacement ›
Trending
By Jonathan Runstadler and Kaitlin Sawatzki
Over the course of the COVID-19 pandemic, researchers have found coronavirus infections in pet cats and dogs and in multiple zoo animals, including big cats and gorillas. These infections have even happened when staff were using personal protective equipment.
Gorillas have been affected by human viruses in the past and are susceptible to the coronavirus. Thomas Fuhrmann via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA
- Gorillas in San Diego Test Positive for Coronavirus - EcoWatch ›
- Wildlife Rehabilitators Are Overwhelmed During the Pandemic. In ... ›
- Coronavirus Pandemic Linked to Destruction of Wildlife and World's ... ›
- Utah Mink Becomes First Wild Animal to Test Positive for Coronavirus ›
By Peter Giger
The speed and scale of the response to COVID-19 by governments, businesses and individuals seems to provide hope that we can react to the climate change crisis in a similarly decisive manner - but history tells us that humans do not react to slow-moving and distant threats.
A Game of Jenga
<p>Think of it as a game of Jenga and the planet's climate system as the tower. For generations, we have been slowly removing blocks. But at some point, we will remove a pivotal block, such as the collapse of one of the major global ocean circulation systems, for example the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC), that will cause all or part of the global climate system to fall into a planetary emergency.</p><p>But worse still, it could cause runaway damage: Where the tipping points form a domino-like cascade, where breaching one triggers breaches of others, creating an unstoppable shift to a radically and swiftly changing climate.</p><p>One of the most concerning tipping points is mass methane release. Methane can be found in deep freeze storage within permafrost and at the bottom of the deepest oceans in the form of methane hydrates. But rising sea and air temperatures are beginning to thaw these stores of methane.</p><p>This would release a powerful greenhouse gas into the atmosphere, 30-times more potent than carbon dioxide as a global warming agent. This would drastically increase temperatures and rush us towards the breach of other tipping points.</p><p>This could include the acceleration of ice thaw on all three of the globe's large, land-based ice sheets – Greenland, West Antarctica and the Wilkes Basin in East Antarctica. The potential collapse of the West Antarctic ice sheet is seen as a key tipping point, as its loss could eventually <a href="https://science.sciencemag.org/content/324/5929/901" target="_blank">raise global sea levels by 3.3 meters</a> with important regional variations.</p><p>More than that, we would be on the irreversible path to full land-ice melt, causing sea levels to rise by up to 30 meters, roughly at the rate of two meters per century, or maybe faster. Just look at the raised beaches around the world, at the last high stand of global sea level, at the end of the Pleistocene period around 120,0000 years ago, to see the evidence of such a warm world, which was just 2°C warmer than the present day.</p>Cutting Off Circulation
<p>As well as devastating low-lying and coastal areas around the world, melting polar ice could set off another tipping point: a disablement to the AMOC.</p><p>This circulation system drives a northward flow of warm, salty water on the upper layers of the ocean from the tropics to the northeast Atlantic region, and a southward flow of cold water deep in the ocean.</p><p>The ocean conveyor belt has a major effect on the climate, seasonal cycles and temperature in western and northern Europe. It means the region is warmer than other areas of similar latitude.</p><p>But melting ice from the Greenland ice sheet could threaten the AMOC system. It would dilute the salty sea water in the north Atlantic, making the water lighter and less able or unable to sink. This would slow the engine that drives this ocean circulation.</p><p><a href="https://www.carbonbrief.org/atlantic-conveyor-belt-has-slowed-15-per-cent-since-mid-twentieth-century" target="_blank">Recent research</a> suggests the AMOC has already weakened by around 15% since the middle of the 20th century. If this continues, it could have a major impact on the climate of the northern hemisphere, but particularly Europe. It may even lead to the <a href="https://ore.exeter.ac.uk/repository/handle/10871/39731?show=full" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">cessation of arable farming</a> in the UK, for instance.</p><p>It may also reduce rainfall over the Amazon basin, impact the monsoon systems in Asia and, by bringing warm waters into the Southern Ocean, further destabilize ice in Antarctica and accelerate global sea level rise.</p>The Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation has a major effect on the climate. Praetorius (2018)
Is it Time to Declare a Climate Emergency?
<p>At what stage, and at what rise in global temperatures, will these tipping points be reached? No one is entirely sure. It may take centuries, millennia or it could be imminent.</p><p>But as COVID-19 taught us, we need to prepare for the expected. We were aware of the risk of a pandemic. We also knew that we were not sufficiently prepared. But we didn't act in a meaningful manner. Thankfully, we have been able to fast-track the production of vaccines to combat COVID-19. But there is no vaccine for climate change once we have passed these tipping points.</p><p><a href="https://www.weforum.org/reports/the-global-risks-report-2021" target="_blank">We need to act now on our climate</a>. Act like these tipping points are imminent. And stop thinking of climate change as a slow-moving, long-term threat that enables us to kick the problem down the road and let future generations deal with it. We must take immediate action to reduce global warming and fulfill our commitments to the <a href="https://www.ipcc.ch/sr15/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Paris Agreement</a>, and build resilience with these tipping points in mind.</p><p>We need to plan now to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions, but we also need to plan for the impacts, such as the ability to feed everyone on the planet, develop plans to manage flood risk, as well as manage the social and geopolitical impacts of human migrations that will be a consequence of fight or flight decisions.</p><p>Breaching these tipping points would be cataclysmic and potentially far more devastating than COVID-19. Some may not enjoy hearing these messages, or consider them to be in the realm of science fiction. But if it injects a sense of urgency to make us respond to climate change like we have done to the pandemic, then we must talk more about what has happened before and will happen again.</p><p>Otherwise we will continue playing Jenga with our planet. And ultimately, there will only be one loser – us.</p>By John R. Platt
The period of the 45th presidency will go down as dark days for the United States — not just for the violent insurgency and impeachment that capped off Donald Trump's four years in office, but for every regressive action that came before.
- Biden Announces $2 Trillion Climate and Green Recovery Plan ... ›
- How Biden and Kerry Can Rebuild America's Climate Leadership ... ›
- Biden's EPA Pick Michael Regan Urged to Address Environmental ... ›
- How Joe Biden's Climate Plan Compares to the Green New Deal ... ›