Is your water safe to drink?

When people talk about nutrition, they often overlook a very important nutrient necessary for good health. WATER! That’s mainly because we’ve taken both for granted for thousands of years. Water has been very good for us until relatively few years ago. All of that has changed now, and we definitely have to think again, as it is getting worse, almost daily.

It is generally recommended that each of us drink 64 ounces of water a day, or 8 8-ounce glasses (full) every day. Actually, the best recommendation for good health is 1 gallon for every 50 pounds of body weight. Few of us get even those 8 glasses a day minimum. According to one study, about 4/5 of all adults do NOT get even this minimum. Most adults in the US are on the brink of dehydration.
Did you know that many nursing home deaths are actually caused by dehydration? Dehydration of the frontal lobes is a major factor in senility and is often misdiagnosed as Alzheimer’s.

People are realizing that the water they drink (from the tap) is no longer very good. The bottled water market is huge, and as a result, every year it becomes more and more profitable. But is all bottled water safe? These are some of the problems:

1. The plastic it is packaged in normally varies. The ?? cloudy ?? the type is not as stable a plastic as the transparent type. And all plastic yields some molecules to water (the universal solvent of philosophers). This is not good for any of us. Hard plastic or glass is best.

2. The water requirements of cities and municipalities are often much more stringent than bottling standards. In a study of 103 brands of bottled water, the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) found that 1/3 of the more than 1000 bottles tested contained bacteria as well as synthetic organic chemicals, and one sample even contained arsenic per above state health limits.

3. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulates tap water standards and promotes a Minimum Federal Standard for cities and states. They have no jurisdiction over bottled water, so there is no real standard to protect us. (Do you trust any water bottler or all the employees of the same?)

Let’s look at some labels and see what they really mean:

1. Bottled Spring Water: Too often, this is just a scam. Yes, it is from a “spring”, but there is no guarantee that the water from this spring is pure. Often times, it is bottled from a local water supply directly from a tap. It is from a spring well, but what spring? There is a lot of money in bottled water, and if you haven’t noticed it is sometimes even more expensive than soda.

2. Drinking water. This is at least half honest. It’s straight from a tap, we can expect it to be at least relatively toxic-free and perhaps meet the minimum federal standard for drinking water. Did you know that many, if not most, of the city and town water supplies in the US DO NOT meet the “Minimum”? (Of course, those “standards” only apply to ladybugs). Good luck.

3. Rainwater harvesting. This traditional way of obtaining “pure water” no longer works very well. The amount of toxic material in the air results in “acid rain” in much of the US When my wife and I sailed through the Caribbean a few years ago, we collected all the water that way and simply filtered it through a carbon block filter after adding a little bleach to kill any airborne bacteria. It worked because ocean rain is so much purer than most of the rain on land.

4. Carbon filtered water. These are those little “screw-on” or “jug” water filters. Some even have a silver nitrate element to kill bacteria included. Few are good enough to remove most of the worst pollutants. And few people change filters often enough, so the contamination reappears. They give you a false sense of security and because of the charcoal filtering the water smells and tastes better, but in most areas it’s just not very good. (Perfume can cover a pollution odor, but it does not eliminate the source.)

5. Distilled water. This is great for your steam iron or for making colloidal silver, but unless it is distilled into glass, you may have high amounts of copper or nickel from the distillation pipe used. It usually has no flavor either, it’s pretty flat. But it’s still better than what is likely to come out of your tap.

6. Reverse osmosis water. This is probably the “best” of all drinking waters, ALWAYS the filters are changed regularly. Ideally, there are several “particulate” filters and at least one carbon block filter before the reverse osmosis filter. This reverse osmosis filter is a rubber sheet, and by osmotic action (and water pressure) the water molecules pass from the “dirty” side to the “clean side”. This type of filter can also get clean drinking water from the ocean. It is by far the best water to drink (for great taste, you can add about ¼ teaspoon of sea salt per gallon, or even a few drops of lemon juice).

Those are your options for cleaner, safer water. As you can see I recommend only RO water because it is cheaper and safer than filling a gallon
I found a simple reverse osmosis unit under the counter at Costco or Home Depot for less than $ 150. It was not too difficult to install and works well for a year without changing filters in a two person home. (Otherwise, change the filters every six months.)
Your health depends on you. Hope this helps you make good decisions.

Dr. Phil Bate is the inventor of the new auditory brain wave training system (patent pending) that does the same thing as EEG biofeedback / neurofeedback: it solves brain problems like ADD / ADHD. depression, insomnia, etc. Dr. Bate is a retired orthomolecular psychologist who helps people on free counseling websites at: [http://Alternate-health.com],[http://ADHD-biofeedback.com],[http://AuditoryBrainWaveTraining.com]