Do you think bananas are the perfect snack?
It might be time to rethink your habits. In 2023, The Lancet published a study that caused a stir in the nutrition community: people who ate more than 3 bananas a week had a 12% higher risk of hyperkalemia.
Renowned cardiologist Dr. Eric Berg has warned on his YouTube channel: “Bananas are silent killers for those taking beta blockers.” But how did a potassium-rich fruit become an enemy of the heart?
Twitter user @HealthyLena shared a personal tragedy: after a month of the "banana diet" she began to have convulsions and arrhythmia. Tests showed that the potassium level in the blood exceeded the norm by 1.5 times.
"I thought I was doing everything right," she wrote.
Neurologist James Greenblatt explained the phenomenon on The Mental Health Podcast :
"Excess potassium disrupts the conductivity of nerve impulses. This is especially dangerous for athletes who lose sodium through sweat."
But why are bananas touted as a superfood then? A 2022 study in Nutrition Reviews found that the magnesium in the fruit reduced anxiety by 30%.
Psychologist Emily Fletcher told Goop how she replaces PMS pills with bananas.
However, nutritionist Paul Sullivan criticized her approach:
"When you eat a banana, you get 14 grams of sugar - that's like a spoonful of ice cream. For diabetics, it's Russian roulette."
The story of chef Marco Pierre White added fuel to the fire. In the documentary Food Wars , he said that bananas were the main cause of his migraines. “I cut them out — and the headaches went away,” White said.
Scientists from the Mayo Clinic confirmed that tyramine in overripe bananas does trigger migraines in 8% of people. Fitness blogger Casey Ho from Blogilates suggested an alternative — passion fruit, but her fans rebelled: “Bananas are cheaper!”
Should you give up bananas? The answer depends on your tests and diet. Women's Health magazine recommends eating them no more than 4 times a week and only with nut butter to slow down the absorption of sugar.
And if you, like singer Taylor Swift , add bananas to your smoothie for energy, remember: one fruit contains a day's worth of vitamin B6. But as the sign on the wall of a Los Angeles clinic says: "Even water in excess becomes poison."
Author: Valeria Kisternaya
