Why HCL is present in stomach?

Question

Why HCL is present in stomach?

Answer 1

HCl is a natural catlyst. It breaks down substances. Thats why its found in our stomach. Our body "knows" how much is safe and wil not produce any more than that.  

Answer 2

HCl is an acid. the food that we take when(if) breaks down into bases then the HCl reacts with the base and neutralizes the reaction to form salt and water helping us to be fit from all the problems caused by food.  

Answer 3

This is a variation on a theme . The body already uses a chloride shift

at the tissue and the lung level ( for the Bohr Effect ) and exchanges HCO3-1 for CL^-1 and vice versa. The mitochondrion uses proton pumps to maintain the oxidative phosphorylation potential and for bringing pyruvate into the mitochondrion. So a combined proton pump and the chloride shift makes HCl a natural acid to select for the tasks of maintaining a low stomach pH to kill a variety of pathogens that may enter by the oral route  and to aid pepsin in partial digestion of dietary proteins by denaturing and linearizing the protein chains.

Answer 4

To make the condition of stomach acidic so that the pepsin may activate.