What's in your water?

I hope that you're not drinking any tap water, because you may just feel sick after reading this! Accourding to the Environmental Working Group's (EWG's) two-and-a-half year investigation of water suppliers' tests of the treated tap water served to communities across the country, tap water in 42 states is contaminated with more than 140 unregulated chemicals that lack safety standards! In total, there are 260 different chemical contaminants that are in our drinking water! Now given, 119 of those are regulated with safety standards, but that is still an astounding number of chemicals in our “fresh tap water”. Peculiarly, I had a lot of trouble finding a definitive and official list of all of the 119 regulated chemicals that are in tap water, but I was able to find one resource that made mention of some of the contaminants that are in our tap water. What are some of the chemicals in tap water? Let's see a small list:

Chlorine
Chloramine
Bacteria
Lead
Asbestos
Chemical Pollution:

• trichloroethane (industrial solvents!)

• volatile organic compounds (various plastics, gasolines and petroleum products)

Herbicides:

• dioxin (2-4D)

• lindane

Pesticides:

• DDT (uhuhh)

• malathione

Chlorine-resistant Cysts & Parasites:

• Giardia

• Cryptosporidia

I encourage everyone to look at the elongated version over at Healing Daily.com; what you see here is simply a condensed, bulleted, list for the sake of saving space. This list is hardly the full list of contaminant's that are in our water supply though. Don't forget that the Environmental Working Group had found a total of 260 different chemical contaminants in our water! What I find odd is that I can not – anywhere – find a listing of all the chemical contaminants that are in our water.. I can't even find a full list of what's supposed to officially be in our water “for our own good”. Perhaps it's just a lack of research on my part, but this sort of secrecy is very troubling when it involves the health of millions each day!

You may be wondering as to what the solution is to all of this. Not drinking water isn't an option. Our bodies are made of 70% water and undiagnosed dehydration is prevalent; this is something I will discuss next month. Simply put, we must consume water throughout the day or we risk health complications. But this becomes a problem when the very water we are to consume is literally poison. I was going to wait until next month's newsletter to outline my picks for water filtration, but I decided that it's important to know your options now so that you can keep drinking water and won't waste your money on the wrong product.

The first option many will turn to is bottled water. Is this an option? Eh.... sorta. Bottled water is much cleaner than tap, certainly, but bottled water goes far fewer routine testings than tap and so it has the potential of being contaminated. Another issue, is that it's been discovered that the water will – after a period of time – actually leech chemicals from the plastic containers! So unless you know a good deal about the company you're buying your bottled water from, and know when it was bottled, I'd try to stay away from bottled water as a tap water alternative.

There are two big names that I trust when it comes to water purification: Berkey and Nikken. Both of these companies produce high-end products and make good on their promises. Berkey is a Texas company that produces primarily counter-top hardcore filtraition units that will filter out everything from anywhere (including raw lakes and streams!). In addition to their counter-top units, berkey also sells a similar-styled unit meant for travel (whether that be camping, sporting events, or survival situations), a fantastic shower filter that I use myself, and a sports bottle that also has enough power to filter out raw lakes and streams (I never am found without my sport berkey!). I've used berkey's products for a few years now and i love them; they're also reasonably priced and the Berkey name is well known and respected amongst many groups.

Nikken is also a wonderful company. This Japanese company's products are not limited to just water filtration and really extends to many different categories from air filters to cook ware. I know my Acupuncturist Helen Law purchases and uses a number of products from Nikken. Nikken products are pricey, but I think that they are worth every single penny. More on the subject of water filtration, Nikken offers similar products to Berkey: portable sports bottle, counter top units, and a shower unit. But, Nikken also offers something very hard to find: an under-the-counter water filtration system! Nikken's products filter out the same things that Berkey's products do (although it is worth noting that Nikken advises against using raw untreated water with their products), but they also remineralize the water through the use of their “PiMag” magnet technology. My Acupuncturist's office has one of their units that functions similarly to a water cooler and I must say that the water that came from that thing is probably the best water I've ever tasted so I think that Nikken is on to something with their PiMag technology.

There are other filtration systems out there for water, but I've never used them, and so I can not comment on them. Right now I own a berkey KDF shower filter and a sport berkey and once I can, I plan on buying a nikken under the counter filter system as well. I hope all this has helped! I strongly suggest reading the entire article from Healing Daily and understanding exactly what kind of disgusting things are in our water. There is also the issue of Fluoride, which I will be covering later; it's a huge subject that deserves an article all to itself!