Water - Healthy Choice of Drinking Water

Water - The Essence of Life

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Water is one of the most important element on earth.  How important?  Without water, there will be no life on earth.  That's how important water is.  Water is vital to all known forms of life, hence it is called the essence of life.  Water is also known as the elixir of life and it is definitely not exaggerating at all to say that water is life itself.  This transparent, odorless, tasteless and unique liquid is also an excellent solvent.  In chemist's term, water is called H2O, because its molecule contain one oxygen atom and two hydrogen atoms.  On earth, water exists in its 3 forms naturally, solid, liquid and gaseous.  It is also one of the very few known substances whose solid form is less dense than its liquid form.  Water itself is a very amazing substance, hence it received the most intensive study among other liquid substances.  If you are interested in the chemical knowledge of water, you may click on this link to read more about it.  In our daily life, we use water for drinking, cooking, washing, cleaning, agriculture, chemical processing, transportation, recreation and even fire fighting.  However, it is really sad that many of us possesses very little knowledge regarding water as our drinking water.  Hopefully this blog of mine will help everyone to clearly understand our drinking water.

The Roles of Water in our Body

Image obtained from www.globalhealingcenter.com

Before we jump in to decide what type of drinking water is best for us, it is important to know and understand the roles of water in our body first.  Despite how solid our body appears to be, it is actually more liquid than we think.  Our body can be described as a living aquarium.  While we are still an infant, 80% of our body is water.  When we reached adulthood, depending on our health condition, roughly 70% of our body is still made of water.  This is the reason why the quality of our drinking water directly effects our health, and it is also why we will die within a few days without water.  Water is a major part of our body and generally, water has the following 5 vital roles in our body:

1. Detoxifying the body - During cell metabolism and organ detoxification processes, water is required to either dissolve all the toxins & wastes and carries them to the kidney to be flushed out via our urinary bladder, or as a medium to assist our colon to effectively discard toxins & wastes.  So the purer the water, the better it is for our body's detoxification process.
2. Lubricating joints of the skeletal system - Unlike machines that use oil for lubrication, our skeletal system needs water to keep it lubricated.  Of course, our body does not use water for lubrication directly.  Water is required by our body to produce synovial fluid to lubricate joints of our skeletal system.  Besides lubricating joints of skeletal system, water is also needed to prevent mucosal membranes (eyes, mouth, ears, nose, etc) from drying out.
3. Supporting the digestive system - One of the major element that is required to maintain optimal digestive functions is water.  If we have sufficient oxygen and food, but no water, it would be difficult for our body to properly digest the food.
4. Regulating body temperature - Unlike cold-blooded reptiles, humans are warm-blooded mammals that has the ability to maintain a stable body temperature despite the changes of temperature of our environment.  Water is a good heat conductor, hence it plays an important role in assisting our body to maintain its body temperature.  In order for our body to effectively regulate our body temperature, we must keep our body well hydrated.
5. Delivering nutrients and oxygen to cells - Our blood is responsible for delivering nutrients and oxygen to cells, and our blood is roughly made of 90% water.  Water, on its own, will not know what nutrients our body needs, but our red blood cells know and water is required by our red blood cells to carry out its duty to deliver nutrients and oxygen to all other cells.

Now that we know about the roles of water, the next thing that we need to know is, which organ is responsible for absorbing the water that we drink.  When we drink water, the water that enters through our mouth, passes through esophagus tube to reach our stomach and finally reaches our intestine where it is absorbed.  So always remember, it is our intestine that is responsible for absorbing the water that we drink.  Our body is a very wonderful and complete system.  There is no need for us to tell it what to do, our body's systems are fully automated.  The only 3 things that they need us to provide are water, food and oxygen.

Image obtained from www.susifit.com

Ever wonder why we MUST drink water although we have plenty of food that has very high water content?  The answer is very simple and straight forward.  Food is food, water is water, even if they can be consumed together, they serve different purposes and they cannot replace each other.  We need to drink water to keep our body hydrated and we need to eat food to keep our body nourished. That is how our body works.  If you want your body to be healthy, it is best to follow it's natural mechanism.

How much Water shall we Drink a Day?

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In order to replenish the water in our body, we have various choices to choose from, plain water, flavored water, fruits, vegetables and juices.  Since the old days, health experts have advised that our daily water intake has to be purely water only, however some modern health experts debated that all other sources of water besides plain water could also be counted as our daily water intake.  If you read through their researches, you'll know that even though other sources of water could be counted as part of our daily water intake, there is still a need to distinguish between sources that hydrates our body and sources that dehydrates our body.  Therefore I do not see the need of risking our health by drinking less plain water.  Yes, plain water is tasteless and it is certainly not as tasty as your favorite beverages such as coffee, tea, sodas, juices, beer, etc, but to maintain optimal health, plain water is the most important drink of all.  It is also important to remember that one of water's major role in our body is to help our body to detox, so the purer the water we drink, the more efficient it is.  Whether you like it or not, for the sake of your own health and for the sake of your body's 60-80 trillion cells that work so hard for you everyday, do put in some effort to drink more plain water.

It is common to hear people saying that we need to drink at least 8 glasses (8 oz or 240 ml of water per glass) of plain water a day.  This estimation is actually a bit vague and probably not sufficient for most people, but it remained popular because it is easy to remember.  Until today, there has been no single formula that fits everyone because there too many factors that influences our daily water needs.  However, having more knowledge about water will help you to get a better estimation on how much water you need.  Here are the various factors that we need to put into considerations:

1. Age - Generally, the older we get, the more water we need
2. Gender - For male and female of same age and weight, male usually needs more water
3. Weight - Majority of our body weight comes from water, hence the heavier we weight, the more water we need
4. Lifestyle - Needless to say, someone who is active in outdoor activities, sports or heavy works will need more water than someone who is less active.  Apart from daily activities, our eating habits also influences our water intake requirements.
5. Environment - Depending on where you are, you may need to drink more water to keep yourself hydrated as some environment tends to dehydrate us faster
6. Health - Certain health condition may restrict the individual's water intake while some health conditions will require the individual to drink more water and more frequently

Let us first look at how age and gender influence our daily water intake.  Please refer to the hydration guideline diagram below, which was made by Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences, for a summary on how much water is required to keep us hydrated.  Do bear in mind that the adequate intake (AI) recommendation is just a guideline, and it is by no means the actual amount of water we need, but it gives us a rough idea of how much water we need in a day.  From this guideline, it can be summarized that the older we get, the more water we need.

Image obtained from plantbaseddietitian.com

Next, let us look at how to determine the amount of water we need from our weight.  Since our body is roughly 70% water, a huge portion of our body weight actually comes from water.  Assuming that 40% of our total body weight is the weight of the water in our body, therefore in order to keep our body hydrated and to replenish the fresh water within our body, we need to drink equivalent amount of water on a daily basis.  The calculation has to be done with your weight in pound (lbs), and the answer that you obtained from the calculation refers to the amount of water required in ounce (oz).  Here is an example on how the calculation is done:

Individual weight: 80 lbs
Daily water intake requirement: 80 x 40% = 32 oz (960 ml)
1 oz is roughly 30 ml and 8 oz (240 ml) is equivalent to 1 glass of water
Therefore, if you weight 80 lbs, your daily recommended water intake is a minimum of 4 glasses of plain water.

Image obtained from www.tarzan-maxx.com

The differences between AI recommendation and weight based recommendation is that AI's calculation includes water that you obtain from other sources such as food, tea, coffee, etc., while weight based recommendation is purely for the minimum amount of plain water that you need to drink.  Hope that this clears any confusion you had after seeing the two diagrams above.  Unless you know how much water your body gets from the food and beverages that you drink, following the weight based recommendation is a better choice to ensure that you met the minimum daily water intake requirements.  There is a rare case called water intoxication or water poisoning, which resulted from over hydration, but accidentally consuming way too much water under normal circumstances is almost impossible.  Let's say you weight 160 lbs and you need to drink 8 glasses of water a day.  Even if you drink 16 glasses of water a day (say 5 glasses in the morning, 8 glasses in the afternoon and 3 glasses at night), you wouldn't get water intoxication, unless you forcefully drink 16 glasses of water in one go.  So rest assure, drinking more water is perfectly safe.  Just as you wouldn't force yourself to eat if you are already feeling full, there is also no need for you to drink more than 2 glasses of water in one go.

Having known the minimum amount of water we need per day, let us move on to see how our lifestyle, environment and health affects our water intake needs.  These few factors are the main reason why there is no one formula that fits everyone's water intake needs.

1. Lifestyle - Our eating habits, drinking habits and daily activities may require us to drink more water.

• Eating habit - If you practice a healthy eating diet, which I believe most of us don't, the minimum water intake requirement is sufficient to keep you hydrated.  If you eat a lot of high sugar, high salt, deep fried, high calories or oily food, you will need to drink more water as these food dehydrates us.  It is a good practice to drink a glass of water 30 minutes before your meal.  Alternatively, you can eat fruits 30 minutes before your meal.
• Drinking habit - How we drink, how often we drink and what type of beverages we drink also effects our water intake needs.  It is recommended that we drink water more frequently (take 3-4 mouth of water, every 30 minutes), rather than gulping 250 ml - 500 ml of water in one go every 1-2 hours.  If you are a coffee or tea lover, it would be good to substitute your 2nd glass of drink with plain water as coffee and sweetened tea actually dehydrate us.  Alcoholic drinks, sodas and other high sugar drinks also dehydrates us.  Do try to maintain the minimum glasses of plain water intake on top of all the other beverages that you drink.
• Daily activities - Doing any activities that make you sweat contributes to lose of fluid in your body, hence you will need to replenish the amount of water you lose from sweating.  The more intense the activity, the more water you need to replenish.  Adding an extra 2-3 glasses of water  on top of your daily minimum water intake requirement after sport activities should be sufficient to replenish the lose fluid from sweating.  If the sport activity is too intense and stretches over a long period of time, it would be good to drink a glass of sport drinks first and then follow by 1-2 glasses of plain water.  Of course, don't drink them all in one go.  Slowly finish the 1-2 glasses of plain water over 20-30 minutes.

2. Environment - Hot and humid environment, cold and dry environment, air-conditioned room, heater heated room, and high altitude (over 2500 m or 8200 ft) are a few environment conditions that require us to drink more water.
3. Health - If your illnesses causes you to lose water, you'll need to drink more water to replenish them.  Under special cases such as last stage kidney failure, there is actually a limited amount of water that you can drink per day.

As a rule of thumb, always bring a bottle of water with you so that you always have water to drink whenever start to feel thirsty or whenever you remembered.  Most importantly, make it a habit to drink water during these times:

1. Drink a glass of water when you wake up
2. Drink a glass of water during or after breakfast
3. Drink a glass of water when you reached your school/office or before you start doing something
4. Drink a glass of water during your morning tea break
5. Drink a glass of water 30 minutes before lunch
6. Drink a glass of water during your afternoon tea break
7. Drink a glass of water when you reached home/before you start preparing for dinner
8. Drink a glass of water 30 minutes before dinner
9. Drink a glass of water before sleep

Of course, if the 9 glasses of water listed above exceeded your weight based minimum daily plain water intake requirement, you may replace some of them with some healthy options such as those shown in the diagram below (10 healthy ways to invigorate your water).  If the 9 glasses of water listed above is below your weight based minimum daily plain water intake requirement, do try to drink water more frequently to keep yourself hydrated.

Understanding our Drinking Water

Just as I have mentioned above, the MOST important drink to maintain our body's optimum health is non other than plain water, our drinking water (H2O).  Hence it is very important for us to understand our drinking water so that we know what is best for our body.  Despite all the advancement that human achieved through science and technology over the past few centuries, it does not change the fact that our biological body has never changed and the water we drink is the same water that has existed on earth since millions of years ago.  All these while, there has only been ONE simple rule that we need to follow to choose our drinking water and this rule is, 'clean water', in other words, 'water that is free from contaminants'.  Simple as that.  Unless our biological body has evolved to work differently, otherwise this rule will never change.  The only thing that has changed is that our water is much more contaminated than it was before, so we must make it contaminant free again to make it not only safe, but also healthy for consumption.

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Coincident or not, just like our earth, our body is also roughly 70% water.  Since 70% of our body is made of water, it is not surprising that our drinking water's quality has a direct impact on our well-being.  In the past, rain water is one of the best source of drinking water because it is the water that has been purified by our mother nature via evaporation and condensation (natural distillation process).  Nowadays, due to air and water pollution, rain water is no longer safe to be consumed as drinking water.  Do you know that many of us are unknowingly drinking contaminated water?  The scary part of contaminated water is that it doesn't always look murky.  In fact, many contaminants lurk within seemingly crystal-clear water.

Image obtained from stclairwellness.net

If I were to tell you that out of the 8 glasses of water above, only one of them is free from contaminants while the rest contains 80,000 chemicals in them, will you be able to tell which one it is?  Definitely not, unless you have some equipment to carry out some tests.

Water Contaminants

Image obtained from greenplanetethics.com

Image obtained from imnh.isu.edu

Image obtained from www.freshwatersystems.com

The top 2 diagrams above clearly shows how badly our water is contaminated and the third diagram above shows how these contaminated water reaches our house.  There are really far too many contaminants in our water, but they can be categorized into 5 major groups:

1. Biological Contaminants - Bacteria, Viruses, Parasites, etc.

• According to CNN Report 2007, unsanitary water is the cause of 1.5 million cases of hepatitis A (and 133 million cases of intestinal worms), and annually, water-related problems are responsible for 4 billion cases of diarrhea resulting in the deaths of more than 6 million children.
• According to the World Bank, 88% of all the diseases int he world are caused by unsafe drinking water, inadequate sanitation and poor hygiene.

2. Organic Contaminants - Lead, Nitrate, Arsenic, Asbestos, Dirt, Sediment, etc.

• According to Earth Day Network, 14 million people in the US now regularly drink water contaminated with carcinogenic herbicides
• Reader's Digest also published that the rise in cancer deaths may be due in part to the pesticides, fertilizers and industrial waste that are increasingly finding their way into our water supplies.

3. Inorganic Contaminants - Pesticides, Herbicides, Industrial Chemicals, etc.

• Society for General Microbiology mentioned that Arsenic is toxic to all living cells, and in people causes fatal cancers of the lung, liver, kidney and bladder.
• US EPA warns that high levels of nitrate cause 'Blue Baby Syndrome' that reduces the ability of blood to carry oxygen.
• US EPA warns that Lead is harmful to the developing brains of fetuses, young children and pregnant women while causing kidney problems & high blood pressure in adults.
• US EPA warns that Asbestos has the potential to cause lung disease and cancer.

4. Disinfection by-products - Trihalomethanes (THMs), Chloroform, Chlorine, etc.

• The Daily Mail Online published that a study of almost 400,000 babies found a clear link between chemicals formed during chlorination and the occurrence of a trio of birth defects.
• US Council of Environment Quality stated that the cancer risk among people drinking chlorinated water is as much as 93% higher than among those whose water does not contain chlorine.

5. Pharmaceutical Drugs - Antibiotics, Hormones, Mood stabilizers, Chemotherapy agents, etc.

• Associated Press (AP) Reported that research shows that even with small amounts of medication in water, cancer cells proliferate, kidney cell regeneration is retarded and blood cells appear inflamed.
• AP also mentioned that male fish exposed to contaminated water have been found to be feminized, creating egg yolk proteins, a process usually restricted to females.
• AP also reported that scientists were able to link drug-dumping to virulent antibiotic-resistant germs and genetic mutations that may cause cancer.
• AP reported that more than 100 different pharmaceuticals have been detected in lakes, rivers, reservoirs and streams throughout the world in Asia, Australia, Canada and Europe - even in Swiss lakes and the North Sea
• AP reported that 56 pharmaceuticals or disinfect by-products were discovered in treated drinking water and adding chlorine makes pharmaceuticals more toxic
• AP reported that hospitals and long-term care facilities in US throw away an estimated 113.4 million KG of unused drugs and contaminated packaging annually, whereby most of the drugs go down drains.

With so much contaminants in our drinking water, we are practically killing ourselves, especially our kidneys!  Our kidneys need to filter 1,700 litres of blood on a daily basis, hence consuming poor quality water can overwork our kidneys, resulting in health complications such as kidney diseases, gall bladder cancer, kidney stones, etc.

Choosing Drinking Water

Water is such an important element for everyone of us.  Most people in developing or developed countries drink and use water everyday without realizing how wonderful or how important it is.  Water is so easily available in these countries so many people tends to take it for granted.  This is also the main reason why most people do not know much about drinking water.  In today's market, drinking water can be categorized into 3 main groups:

1. Pure Water (Water without any contaminants)
2. Mineral water (Water with the so-called 'minerals' plus contaminants)
3. Ionized water (Also known as alkaline water, magic water, or even kangen water, and just like mineral water, it also comes with contaminants)

If you were given the above 3 choices, which type of drinking water will you choose?  I will undoubtedly choose No. 1, pure water, water that is free from contaminants.  If the choice you made is not No. 1, you really should read on to get your water facts right, once and for all.  I really hope that this blog of mine will help everyone to clear all their doubts and misunderstandings about drinking water.  It is really sad that there are so many misleading and twisted facts surrounding such an important element of life, so through this blog, I hope to share my water knowledge to everyone.  I am not a water specialist, but I've attended many seminars about water, which are held by Water Quality Association's (WQA) Certified Water Specialist VI (Highest Rank), Michael R. Long, who is also a Member of the WQA's International Standards and Regulations Task Force, a Certified Nutritional Consultant, a Published Author as well as an International Lecturer.

Illness and diseases related knowledge, we should seek advises from doctors as they are the disease specialists.  Nutrients related knowledge, we should seek advises from nutritionists as they are the nutrient specialists.  As for water related knowledge, we should of course seek advises from water specialists.  This is a very very important factor that most people neglected and this is also a loop hole that unethical companies utilized to mislead their customers.

Photo of Michael R. Long (Left) and myself (right), taken during one of his seminars that I attended

Debunking Water Myths

1. Pure water - Water that is purified through Reverse Osmosis (RO) or Distillation process
Myths:

1. RO water and distilled water are too 'clean'.  They lack minerals which are part of our nutritional requirement, so they are not good for our health.
2. Distilled water and RO water are 'dead' water.  Dead water is very hard for our body to absorb and will cause dehydration.
3. Distilled water is for car battery and chemical experiments in lab, it is not for drinking.
4. RO water will reverse our cell's osmosis process.
5. RO water and distilled water will leach minerals and nutrients from our cells, making us deplete of nutrients.  If you drink RO water or distilled water in the long run, you will get osteoporosis, weak limbs and many other malnutrition diseases.
6. RO purification system wastes a lot of water in the process of making RO water
7. RO water and distilled water is acidic.  They will increase our chances of getting cancer.

Facts:

1. The claim about water being too 'clean' is a total nonsense to begin with.  If clean water is not good for you, how dirty should the water be in order for it to be good for your health?  Such a ridiculous statement, yet it successfully mislead people without proper water knowledge.  Water is either contaminated (not 'clean') or not contaminated ('clean').  According to WQA's Certified Water Specialist VI, Michael R. Long, "Water, by definition, is just H2O".  Anything other than H2O, are considered to be contaminants that are dissolved by the water.  It is also important to note that virtually all minerals in water are inorganic (dissolved rock/stones or minerals in soil), so they cannot be assimilated well by our body.  Even if these minerals are organic, they are of negligible amount for our daily need.  The American Medical Journal also pointed out very clearly, "The body's need for minerals is largely met through foods, not drinking water."  We must remember that water is NOT food so it is never meant to be a source of nutrients and there is absolutely no need for water to have any minerals.  According to Dr. Norman W. Walker's book, Water Can Undermine Your Health, he mentioned that "A person who drinks two pints (1.1 litres) of impure water a day will, in a 70-year lifespan, consume 200 to 300 pounds of inorganic minerals that the body cannot use.  Some are retained in the body and may cause stiffness in joints; hardening and blockages in arteries; gallstones and kidney stones."  Minerals from food are good for our health, but minerals from water are mostly useless and potentially harmful to our health.
2. Claiming water to be dead water is again another marketing nonsense that some unethical companies came up with in order to market their so-called 'energized' water.  Both RO and distillation process do NOT possess any process that could 'kill' the water or in technical terms, 'remove' water's energy.  This totally defies the physics' law of conservation energy, which states that energy cannot be created or destroyed.  RO and distillation process also do NOT possess any extraordinary abilities that allows them to alter water's natural properties, so how is it possible for our cells to have difficulties absorbing the same water?  The water we drink has gone through millions of years of natural distillation process (evaporation & condensation), if distilled water is dead water, there won't be any living organisms left on earth.  If RO water is 'dead' water, astronauts who only drink RO water in space would have died of dehydration within a week as they do not have any other sources of water.  NASA has been using RO purification system in space ships for over half a century.
3. Just because distilled water is used in car battery, chemical laboratory or some factory processes, it doesn't mean that they are not for human consumption.  The reason why distilled water is used is purely because these processes require pure water for better result.  There is nothing wrong with drinking it.  Mother nature has been purifying our water for us through condensation and evaporation processes and distillation is an imitation of the very same process.
4. Osmosis is the name for the natural process whereby water of different saline solution, separated by a semi-permeable membrane, migrated from a weaker saline solution to a stronger saline solution to gradually equalize the saline composition of each solution.  In reverse osmosis process, water is forced to move through a semi-permeable membrane from a stronger saline solution to a weaker solution.  To put it in simple terms, osmosis is as if you are putting a sponge into a bowl of water.  The sponge will absorb the water in the bowl.  Reverse osmosis is as if you are now squeezing the water out of the sponge that is full of water.  There is no chemical reaction or other hidden tricks in this process, so it is impossible for RO water to have a new ability to reverse cell's osmosis process.  This misunderstanding arises from people who mistook the name of the technology as the description of the water's properties.  RO water and distilled water are simply water that are free from contaminants.
5. Dr. Norman W Walker, who is recognized throughout the world as one of the most authoritative students of life, health and nutrition, stated that, 'Distilled water leaches out discarded unused minerals from our body'.  The misunderstanding of 'distilled water and RO water leaches minerals from our body' probably arises from people who did NOT pay proper attention to what Dr. Norman W Walker said, or they shorten their notes too much until they missed out the most critical points.  Dr. Norman W Walker was actually referring to the positive, cleansing effect of pure water in removing unusable inorganic minerals from our body.  Remember that one of water's vital role in our body is detoxifying our body.  Inorganic minerals are the only minerals that are rejected by our cells.  If these unused minerals are not discarded from our body, it could cause arterial obstructions and many other health damages.  If you are diagnosed to have osteoporosis, malnutrition or when you undergo a urine test and found that it contain lots of discarded minerals, you should correct your food diet instead of blaming the distilled water or RO water that you drink.  Our cells are the ones who control what minerals to keep and what minerals to discard.  Water CANNOT forcibly suck out minerals from our cells.
6. It is true that RO purification system does require more water to produce RO water, but these extra water aren't discarded for nothing.  Just as you need to flush the toilet after using, RO membrane also needs to be cleaned during the process of purification in order to prolong its lifespan and to ensure that it works to its optimum capacity.  According to American Water Works Association, on a per day basis, a normal household of 4 uses an average of 50L of water for washing dishes, 228L of water for washing clothes, 320L of water on flushing toilets and 193L of water on bathing.  In comparison, a normal household of 4 only needs 36L of water per day for RO system's auto membrane cleansing.  So how is that a waste of water?  Why don't you stop using washing machine because it uses so much water?  Or maybe you should buy new clothes every time you need to change them because washing clothes wastes lots of water?  Flushing toilet wastes the most water, maybe you want to pass urine in your garden and only use toilet when you need to pass stool?  I understand that people can be very picky for no specific reasons, but what else do you expect from a system that cleans itself automatically?  You need water to clean nearly everything.  Using a bit of water to clean the RO membrane is definitely not a waste of water.
7. To be exact, RO water and distilled water are actually neutral.  However, due to their strong solvent property, they easily dissolve carbon dioxide upon contact with air, making it slightly acidic.  The idea of drinking alkaline water probably originated from another misunderstanding of Dr. Ragner Berg's famous theory, 'A healthy diet should consists of 80% alkaline food and 20% acidic food'.  Again, these people are assuming that if their diet is too acidic, they can drink alkaline water to balance it out.  Sounds logical?  Yes, it does sounds quite logical, but unfortunately, our body doesn't work that way.  People who came out with the alkaline water idea are people who do NOT understand how our body works.  Please do not forget that the organ that is responsible of absorbing water is our intestine.  Before any water we consumed reaches our intestine, it will have to pass through our stomach first.  No matter how alkaline the water is, after passing through our stomach, it will become either neutral or acidic, so this totally renders the alkaline water idea useless.  It is also important to note that Dr. Ragner Berg's theory applies strictly to FOOD only.  If you still believe that the slightly acidic RO water and distilled water is bad for your health, maybe you should ban yourself from consuming all fruit juices because all fruit juices are at least 10 times more acidic than RO water or distilled water.  Do you know that fruits and fruit juices are actually alkaline food even though they are "acidic" when being tested with pH paper?  The pH test of water doesn't mean anything to our body.  In case you haven't realized, according to pH test, alcoholic drinks are "alkaline".  Do you know any alcoholics who has healthy body?  The pH test has been misused to cheat people with no proper knowledge in this field.  Unfortunately, even some doctors fall for this trick, so it is hard to blame others for believing their marketing hypes.

2. Mineral water - Water that is either extracted from underground water reservoirs and filtered before it is bottled, or obtained directly from tap water that has passes through some filtration systems
Myths:

1. Minerals are part of our nutritional requirement, so we need to drink mineral water.
2. In today's society, due to unhealthy eating habits, we hardly get enough minerals from our food, so drinking mineral water is the simplest and cheapest way to replenish minerals for our body.
3. Minerals exists in water naturally in our mother nature.  Since it is natural, it must be good for our body.
4. A good water filtration system can eliminate all harmful contaminants, leaving only the good minerals in water for us.

Facts:

1. Just as I have explained above, water is not food.  We do not need to risk our health by drinking contaminated water for the sake of negligible amount of minerals.  No matter how you look at it, the danger of the contaminants in water greatly surpasses the negligible amount of minerals in water.  If you are mineral deficient, you can easily solve the problem through proper diet or supplementation.  However, if you are intoxicated by the numerous contaminants in water, the damage is severe and could be irreversible.  There is no reason to risk your health over a negligible amount of minerals which may or may not be usable by our body.
2. It is definitely true that most people in today's society have unhealthy eating habits, but the idea of replenishing minerals through drinking water is not only unrealistic, but also a grave mistake.  Almost all minerals in tap water and underground water are inorganic, so it is useless for us even if we consume it.  In addition, if we truly want to replenish minerals through drinking water, be prepared to drink more than 60 bottles of 500 ml mineral water!  Don't even bother to give it a try because drinking that much water will lead to water intoxication and get you killed.
3. Minerals exist in soil and rocks naturally, but they most certainly do NOT exist in water naturally.  Water simply picks them up while it is on its way to the underground reservoirs, so unlike food, minerals do NOT exists in water naturally, they are contaminants!  Since the bottled water's manufacturing companies can't be bothered to purify the water, they simply claim that these minerals exist in water naturally and make use of the fact, 'we need minerals', to mislead people.  Due to the lack of proper water knowledge, most people especially kids, are made to believe that the minerals found in water are the same as those that are found in food.  Would you prefer to obtain minerals from fruits and vegetables or to obtain your minerals from soil and rocks?  Although both of them are natural minerals, minerals from fruits and vegetables are for human, while minerals from soil and rocks are for plants.  If minerals for plants and minerals for human are the same, that means you can eat fertilizers to replenish nutrients.  Or maybe you fancy adding iron bars, zinc plates and lime stones into your water container to add more minerals to your water?  I'll rather drink yogurt, herbal drinks, fruit juices or vegetable juices to gain minerals that I know is organic and truly beneficial to my body.
4. According to WQA's Certified Water Specialist VI, Michael R. Long, "There is NO such thing as a purification method that selectively allows only 'good' minerals to pass through.  If the water contains minerals, you can be certain it is contaminated.  Water by definition, is just H2O".  WQA is an organization that is in charge of certifying drinking water treatment products and many other certifications that are related to water.  If the highest ranking water specialist from WQA said that such technology doesn't exist, then it really doesn't exist because they will undoubtedly be the first to know about water related purification or filtering technologies.  Besides, there is also absolutely NO reason to keep these minerals in water.  They are minerals for plants, and even if there is a small portion of these minerals are for human ('good' minerals), the amount would be so small that they are totally negligible.  Why would you want to keep these negligible and potentially harmful minerals in your drinking water?  It's totally incomprehensible and a waste of effort.  Any companies that claim that their water treatment device could remove all other bad contaminants while retaining 'good' minerals in the water are simply telling lies.  They are just trying to cover up the fact that their filtration system is only capable of removing a selective portion of the contaminants.  As for the contaminants that they couldn't remove, they will either tell you that our water is not yet contaminated by those contaminants, or that those contaminants are 'good' minerals that we need.

3. Ionized water - Tap water that has passes through some ionizing systems to give the water alkaline or acidic properties
Myths:

1. Drinking alkaline water will make your body alkaline.  Acidic body is the root cause of all chronic diseases and drinking alkaline water can reverse them.
2. There are many other myths surrounding alkaline water, but the link below will answer all your questions

Truths:

1. Please refer to the following blog for a detailed discussion about ionized water's truth.
2. Here is a video, made by an author, Markus Rothkranz, who regretted writing a book to promote alkaline water.  In this video, Markus interviewed a medical expert, James Sloane, who explained to him about acid and alkaline substances and how they effect our body: The Alkaline Myth & Hype - The Acid-Alkaline Truth Exposed

A word of advise, stay away from ionized water.  It is not a water purification or water filtration system because it almost doesn't remove any contaminants from water.  If you ask any WQA certified water specialists, no matter what rank they are, they will definitely recommend pure water as the healthiest choice of drinking water.  When we choose drinking water, there is only ONE factor that we need to consider,  'Is the water free from contaminants?'.  Simple as that.  Choose your drinking water wisely, as it effects not only your own health, but also the health of your next generations.  No matter what type of drinking water you choose to drink after reading my blog, it is your choice, but I really do hope that you will start drinking RO water as it is truly the healthiest source of drinking water, provided you own a really good water purification system that produces RO water.

Understanding Water Treatment Technologies

In the market, they are hundreds or even thousands types of water purification/filtration systems, but the technologies that are used are the same.  Nevertheless, the same technology comes in many different grades and quality, therefore it is important to check whether the water purification system or water filtration system is officially certified by reputable organizations such as NSF (National Sanitation Foundation) or WQA (Water Quality Association).  Technically, water purification system and water filtration systems are totally different.  The former is a system that aims to make the water as pure as possible, while the later is a system that only aims to make the water 'safe' enough to drink.

Understanding what each of these water treatment technology does will not only greatly help us to identify the best water treatment system for our needs, but also help us to avoid being blinded by exaggerated claims and non existing technologies.  Let us take a look at the various water treatment technologies that are available in the market today and understand what contaminants they can/cannot remove:

1.   Boiling - This is one of the oldest water treatment technology.  The ONE and ONLY function of this water treatment is to kill biological contaminants such as bacteria, viruses, parasites, etc.  Boiling water doesn't remove anything from the water, so when you drink boiled water, you are also consuming the dead bodies of all the microorganisms in it.  If the water you boil has been treated with chlorine, boiling water will turn chlorine into a more dangerous cancer causing carcinogen called trihalomethanes.
2.   Ozone - Ozone is a toxic gas that is formed by 3 unstable oxygen atoms.  Due to its oxidizing property, ozone treatment is slightly more superior than chlorination in terms of killing of microorganisms.  Other advantages of ozone treatment includes eliminating odor, and making it easier to remove a wide range of organic and inorganic contaminants, because it will make these contaminants insoluble.  However, this is a hazardous technology that requires a much complicated operation and maintenance.  There are also some issues with the by-products of ozone treatment as well as ozone generation (ozone is a toxic gas which is fatal if inhaled).  This technology is normally only used in water treatment plants or industrial, and is rarely used in household due to safety purposes.
3.   Ultra violet (UV) light - This technology has a wide variety of usage.  In water treatment systems, UV light's function is almost exactly the same as boiling water.  It is only used for killing microorganisms in water.  If you own a water treatment system that uses UV light technology for disinfection, do check its certification to find out it's grade.  Usually water treatment systems that made used of this technology will have its product tested and certified by NSF.  Upon passing the test, NSF will issue an NSF/ANSI 55 certification for the product.  However, do take note that there are 2 grades under this certification, Class A and Class B.  Class A grade means that it is capable of disinfecting treated water thoroughly, while Class B is only capable of disinfecting non-disease causing bacteria.  Thankfully, our water has already been treated with chlorine at our local water treatment plant, hence the addition of UV light is actually unnecessary.  Do avoid systems that uses this technology as they are not only useless, but also costly.
4.   Sediment filter - Sediment filter is a very basic filtration technology.  Although it is incapable of removing the dangerous contaminants, it is good enough to make water appear crystal clear.  Sediment filters usually has membrane size that ranges from 1.0 - 5.0 micron, making it good enough to filter out visible contaminants such as sand, rust, plant spores and pollen.
5.   Multimedia layered filter - During the late 80's, this technology is a big hit.  Although it only performs almost as good as a good quality sediment filter, this filtration technology looks more attractive and serves some educational purposes for kids, letting them know how spring water is filtered by our mother nature.  Facing today's water contamination issue, this type of filtration technology is only sufficient for point-of-entry (POE) usage.  In other words, it is good enough for filtering the water that we use for all other household activities except drinking.
6.   Carbon Block Filter - This is an ancient water treatment technology that is indispensable because activated carbon can absorb organic contaminants (dioxin, herbicides, pesticides, VOCs, etc.), disinfect by-products (chlorine, trihalomethanes, etc.) and eliminate bad taste or odor in water.  Generally, they are divided into two types, powdered blocks filter and granular activated filter.  The effectiveness of carbon filters are measured based on their surface area, the flow of water and of course the source of the carbon.  The source of the activated carbon determines whether it is just capable of removing chlorine and improve taste and odor, or capable of removing a wide range of contaminants including asbestos, lead, mercury and volatile organic compounds (VOCs).  If your water treatment system is NSF/ANSI 53 certified, you will be able to find a list of organic contaminants and disinfect by-products that it can absorb.  Activated carbon filter is ineffective when it comes to inorganic contaminants such as Arsenic, Nitrate, Fluoride, Cadmium, etc., which are some very deadly contaminants.
7.   Ultra filtration -  Similar to sediment filter, ultra filtration uses membrane size to prevent contaminants from passing through.  Ultra filtration has membrane size of 0.1 micron, so it can block a much wider range of contaminants.  It is capable of blocking contaminants such as asbestos and colloidal silica.
8.   Nano filtration - Nano filtration technology also uses membrane size to block contaminants.  The membrane size of nano filtration can be as small as 0.001 micron.  Some companies claimed that their purification system is using RO technology, but in actual, they are just using nano filtration.  Although nano filtration is capable of filtering out synthetic dye and the dead bodies of viruses, it is unable to block dissolved solids, radioactive substances and metal ions.
9.   Ceramic - Ceramic is well-known among the Chinese because bio ceramic emits far-infrared rays, which is believed to have beneficial effects such as making water clusters smaller (easier absorption) and energizing water (FIR is a source of heat hence it can provide energies to increase water molecule).  In terms of filtration, ceramic is also only as good as a sediment filter.
10. Reverse Osmosis - There is nothing extraordinarily fancy about this technology.  Visually, reverse osmosis membrane appears to be no different from nano or ultra filtration filter, but a true RO membrane should be as fine as 0.0001 micron.  This semi-permeable membrane of RO system is what sets it apart from nano filtration.  On its own, RO membrane may not be able to remove all contaminants, but a well designed reverse osmosis purification system is capable of removing virtually all contaminants in water.  Throughout the world, there are only 4 companies (1 in South East Asia and the other 3 are in US) which has successfully obtained and maintained their WQA's S-300 Gold Seal.  If you are looking for RO purification system, look for one that is certified with WQA's S-300 Gold Seal.  If you can't find one, at least make sure that the RO membrane used is 0.0001 micron.
11. Distillation - Distillation is an imitation of our nature's evaporation and condensation process.  A well designed distillation system could produce water that is as pure as a well designed RO purification system.  The only disadvantage of distillation is its high energy consumption and bulkiness.
12. Alkaline/Ionization - This technology makes use of electrolysis, an ion exchange process, to split minerals found in water into two groups, +ve charged and -ve charged.  Strictly speaking, this technology is really useless in terms of water purification or water filtration.  It is utterly useless in removing contaminants, and to make things worse, it may make the contaminants more concentrated or deadly.  It may be a fancy technology for science lab experiments, but it is most certainly not fit for making drinking water.
13. De-ionization - Although this technology also uses ion exchange process, its purpose is just to remove additional ion from water.  Just for your information, chemists call de-ionized water DI water, and they need this type of water for most experiments.

The diagram below summarizes the effectiveness of various water treatment technologies in removing contaminants from water:

Thanks to the many misleading advertisements and marketing strategies of unethical companies out there, many people have been made to believe that they needed 'something' more than water in their drinking water.  I hope that this sharing of mine will be helpful to you.  Thank you very much for visiting and reading my blog.

Disclaimer

1. All the above information is true to my knowledge.  If there are any mistake in the information that I provided in here, feel free to let me know so that I can correct the mistake.
2. I am a distributor of Elken Sdn Bhd, an MLM company that distributes Bio Pure K-Series, RO purification system that is certified with WQA's S-300 Gold Seal.  Yes, Elken is the ONLY company in Asia Pacific region that has earned the S-300 Gold Seal.  Of course, I definitely hope that my blog will generate sales for me, but this is definitely not the reason why I made this blog.  I sincerely made this blog to share truthful knowledge and to make new friends.
3. This is my personal blog.  All its contents are personally composed by me.
4. Whatever products or services that I recommended through this blog of mine, is purely and solely based on their quality.  It will be meaningless if you know that you need to drink RO water, but you cannot find any good RO purification system or good sources of RO water.
5. I will not recommend any products or services that I wouldn't use for myself or my family.  If a product is good, I'll tell you it is good.  If a product is not good, even if it is a product of my company, I will honestly tell you that it is not good.
6. Photos found in my blog are obtained from various sources.

Thank you very much for reading my blog.  Feel free to share it with your family and friends if you like what I am sharing.