Why Mineral Water is the Best Drinking Water

• Bottled Waters: Are All Created Equal?
• Purified Water: To Drink or Not to Drink
• Chlorination: Heart Disease & Cancer
• Bathing: A Chemical War Zone?
• Asbestos: Now In Drinking Water
• Animal Studies: The Compelling Evidence
• Mineral Analysis of Michigan Mineral Water

Bottled Waters: Are All Created Equal? [ Top ]
Bottled water is big business. And it usually tastes better than what comes out of your tap. But is it “healthy water?” It depends. Ask yourself: “Is the water hard? Is it moderately high in TDS?” Most bottled water labels in the US do not give the information you need to know the answers to these questions. Request a complete water analysis from the company. Keep in mind many bottled waters are simply processed water using distillation, reverse osmosis, de-ionization or filtration. Frankly you can do this yourself and save money. With over 700 brands of bottled water available in the US, around 80% are processed water. Purchase only natural spring or artesian well waters that come closest to the “healthy water” criteria – hardness 170 mg/l and TDS 300 mg/l. References:(47)

Michigan Mineral – Premium Natural Water has a Hardness of 260 mg/l and TDS 362 mg/l.

Purified Water: To Drink or Not to Drink[ Top ]
De-mineralized water has little or no minerals. This is the result if you use a distiller, a reverse osmosis unit (RO), or de-ionization (ion exchange resins). However, the research on heart disease and cancer shows a healthy water is hard and moderately high in TDS (total dissolved solids). Why do people purchase these de-mineralized or water softening systems? Usually their thinking goes something like this. “I know I should drink water, but it’s so polluted with chlorine, chemicals and toxic metals, that it’s not safe. So I’ll get rid of these harmful things and all will be OK.”

Not really. Creating a “healthy water” means removing the harmful agents but keeping the beneficial minerals. “Minerals in drinking water are more easily and better absorbed than minerals from food,” according to Dr. John Sorenson, a leading authority on mineral metabolism.

Purifiying devices remove everything from the water, harmful bacteria and beneficial minerals. This stripped water cannot sustain life even in a fish bowl. All fish require minerals to prosper, and if allowed to live in these types of water will perish. If this type of water is ingested for long periods of time, it can leach out valuable body minerals such as potassium, magnesium, sodium and calcium. Mineralized water is needed for all cellular functions and if there are no minerals in your drinking water your body will rob the minerals from somewhere in your body to satisfy its needs. One can take mineral supplements to replace them however, it is not easy to replace the minerals in our bodies in the same form that we lost them. References: (5) , (7) , (22) , (44) , (46) , (50)

Chlorination: Heart Disease & Cancer [ Top ]
Is the chlorine in our municipal drinking water acting as a catalyst triggering tumor development both in atherosclerosis (heart disease) and cancer? In the late 1960′s Joseph Price, MD.., wrote a fascinating, yet largely ignored book entitled, Coronaries, Cholesterol, Chlorine. Based on his experiments he boldly shows, “Nothing can negate… the basic cause of atherosclerosis and .. heart attacks and most common forms of strokes is chlorine. The chlorine contained in processed drinking water.”

Can chlorine be linked to cancer too? Chlorine combines with natural organic matter creating cancer causing trihalomethanes (THMs). Collectively THMs include such carcinogens as chloroforms, bromoforms, carbon tectachloride, bischlorothane and others.

Drinking chlorinated tap water destroys beneficial bacteria in the body which will weaken and eventually damage one’s immunity, and should also be avoided.

Studies from Louisiana, New York, Maryland and Ohio reveal where there are higher levels of THMs the result is higher levels of cancer. References: (2) , (14) , (16) , (18) , (23) , (30) , (34) , (35) , (37) ,(51) ,(52)

Bathing: A Chemical War Zone? [ Top ]
Preliminary research suggests that the ingestion of harmful chemicals from drinking water may not be the primary route of exposure. Both skin absorption and inhalation have been studied. Skin versus oral absorption rates for toxic chemicals in both children and adults show much higher rates of chemical absorption from skin than from oral ingestion for toluene, ethyl benzene, and styrene. Inhalation from showering for TCE (trichloroethylene) was 6 to 80 times greater than from drinking. Lover’s of hot tubs & pools beware!

One should consider a using point of use shower filter. This is for chemical, not mineral removal. This can solve your bathing water problems. References: (3) , (8) , (9)

Asbestos: Now In Drinking Water [ Top ]
Asbestos is starting to be discovered in some drinking water systems. Many of us have heard the stories of asbestos inhalation and cancer. Dr. Irving J. Selikoff painstakingly documented the relationship between occupational asbestos exposure and increased respiratory and digestive cancer. He found that it generally took at least 20 years of exposure to asbestos before the damage shows and when it does it’s generally too far advanced. Selikoff calls this the 20 to 30 year rule for environmental disease to show its horrible face.

Studies done in the cities of Duluth, Minneapolis, Iowa City, San Francisco on people drinking water with asbestos are starting to show that they have higher levels of cancer deaths of the stomach, small intestines, pancreas, gastro-intestinal area and lungs. This is the same pattern as from asbestos inhalation. Yet these cancers are starting to show up after only 10 to 15 years of exposure. References: (17) , (18) , (42) , (45)

Animal Studies: The Compelling Evidence [ Top ]
The research presented in other sections from Healthy Water has been based mainly on human studies usually looking at large populations or epidemiological analysis. These numerous studies have lead me to advocate that a “healthy water” is one that contains moderate amounts of TDS, is hard, and has an alkaline pH. What do the animal studies reveal?

Most animal experiments use water that is made “hard” or “soft” to which various harmful substances like cadmium, lead, chlorine or fluoride, have been added. What is usually found is that animals drinking the hard water have less of the harmful agent in their tissues than the animals drinking the soft water.

The animal experiments dramatically and clearly support the main conclusions observed from the human studies. Namely, hard water is healthier than soft water. References: (1) , (6) , (19) , (27) , (32) , (36) , (37)

References

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Mineral Analysis of Michigan Mineral Water [ Top ]

Calcium . . . . . . . 193 mg/l
Magnesium . . . . . . 58 mg/l
Phosphoros . . . . . . 4 mg/l
Zinc . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 mg/l
Sodium . . . . . . . . . 0 mg/l
pH . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7.4