So how important is water to your body? How much of your body is made of water? How m
uch do you really need? And is there a difference in water? Well water is more important to the body then most people even begin to know. For starters, your bones are quarter of water. The muscles that drive your body are three-quarters water. The brain that controls your entire body is whopping 76% water. The blood that circulates throughout your body and carries your nutrients is 82% water. The lungs that provide you oxygen are nearly 90% water. These are just basic facts of biochemistry and give you an idea of how really important water is to the human body. In a nut shell the most important nutrient in your body is plain water.
Light exercise in a temperate climate uses half a gallon of water a day in breath, sweat, and urine. And here in Phoenix, AZ those numbers jump even higher. For athletes those numbers double and even triple! Athletes in heavy training use over two gallons a day. How crucial is that you ask? Dehydrate a muscle by only 3% and you cause about a 10% loss of contractile strength.
For years now I’ve known of the importance of water and how hard it was and still is to get clean water. And just to give you an idea of how bad the tap water is. Yes they say they clean it and they do but to very minimal standards. They use sedimentation, filteration, chemical conditioning, and disinfections with chorine. The funny thing is, the toxic metals, pesticides, industrial chemicals, are all still in they’re when it comes out of your tap. So are the 50 or so chemicals used in the water treatment. So are the dead bacteria killed by the chlorine itself, which are known to cause liver and colorectal cancers! No it won’t kill you out right or even make you obviously sick, but your body is never going to run well on poison.
I remember just 8 years ago spending just .75 cents for distilled water, ah not any more. It amazes me how anything that is good for you they mange to charge an arm and a leg to get it. Now people are paying millions a year for bottle water and the sad truth is most of it isn’t that different from your tap. Let me explain.
Bottled water makes money, with people paying millions for bottled water each year. Most people believe that the Food and Drugs Administration carefully regulates this industry because it sells the most important nutrient in the human body. No way! Beyond simple hygiene, the bottled water industry is almost entirely self-regulated. Why? Because most bottled water is simply tap water put through minimal conditioning filters to make it taste better. That’s why it’s so profitable. Brands called “Mineral Water”, "VitaminWater" may have a modicum of mineral added. And “Sparkling Minerals Waters”, seltzers, and club sodas also have carbonation added. But they are all just tap water with most of its contaminants still in there. Brands labeled “Spring Water” legally have to be from a spring, unless the words are brand names or parts of a brand name. Then they are just tap water.
There is nothing wonderful about springs anyway. They are never pure water. Spring contains all kinds of organic matter and often some very toxic mineral, I know several springs in the Grand Canyon National Park that look as pure as new snow, but contain enough natural arsenic to kill you outright. FDA regulations do not require water bottlers to test their waters for a huge variety of toxic contaminants likely to be present in bottled water. Remember the Perrier fiasco? Perrier voluntary withdrew its whole American stock, 72 million bottles, because traces of benzene got into one batch from a faulty filter. The company acted very responsibly, but the public was appalled, Benzene in drinking water!
I have news for you. The FDA does not require bottled water companies even to test for benzene, or for a variety of other solvents or hydrocarbons that may be in the water. So the big question is, what is the best you can buy? Well the absolute best is distilled. Virtually everything is removed from the water by steam distillation. Distilled water contains about 2-12 ppm contaminants. That’s about as clean as you can get. That’s why distilled is so much more expensive then others. Compare that with typical faucet water, 350-1000 ppm contaminants, not even a close second. Here at NexLev we provide free bottled water for our clients which is cleaned using a process called four step reverse osmosis. No it’s not better then distilled but it’s a close second. The machines used to do this process cost thousands and any machine that truly cleans your water cost a lot. Those simple cheap filters that hook up to you faucet or come built into one of your drinking bottles are a waste a time. They only remove some containments, enough to change the look and taste, but Leave mostly all of the original containments behind. So the next time you pick up that bottle water and your goal is to be fit for life your best bets are going to be Distilled or Reverse osmosis.
Until next time.
People first everything else second!