It seems that there is a huge interest in improving health but there is also a lot of confusion.

The response I have been receiving regarding the healthy water issue has been ongoing, so in an effort to close this subject and move on here are a few final words addressing potential health issues and their solutions.

The effects of chlorine and its byproducts on the human body are not only diverse, but not well understood yet.

There is a lot of money involved in chlorine products and chlorine dependent processes, so powerful companies and influential people benefiting from these chemicals do their best to muddy the waters, so to speak.

I prefer not to focus on politics and conspiracy theories for this blog, so I’ll be brief regarding the harmful health effects of chlorine.

Perhaps the most prominent potential side effect of chlorine and its byproducts is cancer.  This, by itself, should be enough to encourage the use of filters.

Other effects include damage to the nervous system, skin, hair, and respiratory system.

After installing our home shower filters, one of the more obvious changes I noticed was a decrease in skin dryness, less hair in the drain, and of course no swimming pool smell.

Asthma and allergy sufferers would also benefit tremendously from shower filters.  Although there are no clear studies that document this, it is conceivable that chlorinated water adds to overall inflammation in the body, taxes the immune system, decreases energy, accelerates aging.

Truly, there are more dangers to chlorinated water than we know.

Best to use filters for the entire house.

The next obvious question is: What kind of filter should I use?

Carbon based filters will generally do a good job of removing chlorine and harmful organic substances.  Reverse osmosis sytems also filter well using a multistage process that also involves activated carbon.  The only draw back with reverse osmosis is the amount of waste water that is produced per unit of sanitized water.

Ceramic and disk filters removes organisms and small particles but do not remove chlorine, heavy metals, and small organic molecules, unless combined with another filter medium.

I recommend the Berkey black filters in combination with their fluoride filters.  They do a good job of removing chlorine, flouride, heavy metals, organisms, and volatile organic compounds among other things, while preserving the natural minerals in the water.  Just keep in mind not to use plastic containers that leech BPA.

I also recommend plain ascorbic acid (vitamin C) for the shower.  Although not technically a filter, vitamin C water treatment will neutralize chlorine and chloramines.

This is a good start and an amazingly easy and economical way to remove a major source of personal toxicity.

In Health

–
Nhan-Esteban Khuong, L.Ac.
www.SGVJeetKuneDo.com

Here are a couple of comments I received in response to the last post about reducing toxicity.

I feel these are fairly representative of two prominent schools of thought regarding the issue.  I have also included my own reply.

Comment:

Great article to warn people of toxicity, a vital issue to note if we
want to live longer lives!

Cheers,
Ray

Reply:

Hello Ray,

Thank you for the comment.

I agree that examining the filter used for water purification is
absolutely important.

Regarding dissolved chemicals that are not easily filtered, yes, this
is a real danger.  However, I still feel strongly that a good filter is
the best option for the average consumer and would offer a giant step
up for health.

There are two general alternatives to filters in the consumer water
treatment industry: distillation and deionization.  I do not recommend
either of these processes.  Both produce very pure water, which is
exactly the problem.

Distilled water is stripped of everything, including minerals which in
turn will either strip your body and/or your food of those same
minerals leading to potential health deficiencies.  Furthermore, water
distillation has a few additional inherent problems.  The scaling
(water deposits) resulting from distillation is often removed
chemically, and creating potentially harmful byproducts in order to
have pure drinking water might be self defeating.  Then there is the
issue of the amount of energy involved in purifying the water.  Home
distillers are generally powered by electricity and unless your home is
running on green energy, this is also adding to the overall carbon
footprint of the purification process.

Deionized water, on the other hand, strips water of minerals but does
not remove organic materials that do not have a charge.  For this
reason, many home units will combine an additional filtration step. 
Ultimately, we are left with same issue as distilled water in that the
deionized water is stripped of necessary minerals.

The issue of healthy drinking water is important.  As of now I’m not
certain that there is a perfect solution, however, filtration is a
excellent first step.

In Health,

Nhan-Esteban Khuong, L.Ac.

Comment:

I do some work with the American Chemistry Council and I can promise
that chlorine is not harmful — In fact, if we didn’t have chlorine,
Western civilization probably could not function.  It kills the
bacteria and organic material that cause diseases and U.S. cities have
been using it for over 100 years because it’s safe and effective.

Reply:

Hi There,

Thanks for the comment.

There is no doubt that chlorine has definitely made a significant
impact on modern civilization.  I also have to say that I have a bit
more faith in human ingenuity to believe that Western civilization
would not function without chlorine.

As for its safety, such an active oxidizer that kills bacteria and
destroys other organic material has that very same potential with
humans.  The only difference being, that we are larger than bacteria
and thus feel the effects at a lesser level.

Chlorine is essential to life as we know it, but it is not something we
should be consuming outside of natural food sources.  The harmful
effects of chlorine based sanitation products are too numerous to
mention and so abundant that I won’t explain in detail.

I hope you change your mind about chlorine, because it won’t change its
effects on you.

In Health,

Nhan-Esteban Khuong, L.Ac.

I mentioned the distillation and water deionization processes mainly because the first commenter also runs a health blog, however he advocates distilled water.

In Health,

–
Nhan-Esteban Khuong, L.Ac.
www.SGVJeetKuneDo.com

Humans have long been obsessed with the concept of eternal life, or at least the extension of life.

Considering how short our time is on the planet, a long life definitely a legitimate pursuit.

I have to say however, that the methods we go about this can be bizarre.  In China, the Empress Dowager apparently was purported to have drunk a formula of mother’s milk with new born baby’s urine with a black pearl for longevity.  I don’t think it worked very well if you ask me.

In modern times there is practice called Calorie-Restriction which is essentially eating about 10-25% less than what would otherwise be normal for your size.  Lab tests on rats showed that this practice increased their lifespan by up to 40%.  I’m not so certain that these results would translate to humans, although this route might seem like a reasonable option until you see the support groups needed to cope with the constant suffering resulting from eternal hunger.  Life is for living fully, and calorie restriction sounds like a strange and unusual form of penance.  Besides, we are unlikely to see full human potential on a lack of energy resources.

Without going into the more usual forms of increasing health, and thus longevity, (ie. diet & exercise), I would like to mention the practice of reducing personal toxicity.

Toxicity is a broad term that simply measures the the potential damage that one thing causes to a living organism.  Considering how many things can be damaging to humans, there is plenty of toxicity to reduce.

Water:

Water is essential to life and indoor plumbing has revolutionized human lifestyle.  In order to keep pathogenic organisms in our water supply to a minimum, however, toxic additives are used.  It just so happens that chlorine (a potent oxidant) is more damaging to single celled organisms than to us.  This is probably the single largest source of toxicity that enters the human body.  We breathe it in when we shower, we drink it, we eat it when it gets absorbed into the food through cooking, we swim in it, we wash our clothes with it, we clean our homes with it.

Chlorine and chloramines can be eliminated with the use of shower filters, drinking water filters, and replacing chlorinated home cleaning products with non-toxic sources.  I use a vitamin C based shower filter to avoid to the problems with KDF and activated carbon filters.  I also use a Berkey drinking water filter.  Bottled water, is not as safe and pure as you might think.  I won’t bore you with the details, either take my word for it or take a look for yourself.  Here is an interesting article on bottled water from the Environmental Working Group .

If you buy a filter, make sure the container is not made from lexan, as it leeches BPA.  In fact, the only plastics that appear safe around food are #5 PP “polypropylene, #2HDPE High-density polyethylene, and #4 LDPE Low-density polyethylene.  If you aren’t sure what it’s made of, best to avoid it.  Also keep in mind that some metal containers actually have a polymer lining.  I use a filter with a stainless steel reservoir and glass bottles.

As for household cleaning products, there is nothing that vinegar, hydrogen peroxide, and baking soda can’t handle.  A combination of vinegar and hydrogen peroxide may actually be more effective than the standard 0.5% chlorine solutions.

Reducing toxic contaminants is rather simple, but it does take awareness.  More tips coming soon!

In Health,

–
Nhan-Esteban Khuong, L.Ac.
www.SGVJeetKuneDo.com