Health Matters
From "Maple Street Co-op News", Jun/Jul 2005
The Facts and Myths of Distilled Water
by Kathryn Alexander, DThD
I am often asked about the most effective method of purifying drinking
water. Knowing the hazardous effects of the hundreds of chemicals in
our water (yes, even tank water), I suggest there are only two effective
options
to guarantee the removal of chemicals: distillation or reverse osmosis.
However, with the amount of negative advertising against distillation,
you can imagine the type of enquiries I receive when people read articles
which state that "early death comes from drinking distilled water"
or "alkalinise
or die" and contain very convincing arguments against distilled
water.
So perhaps it's timely to address some of the issues raised in the articles
that abound on the Internet, which try to convince you that distilled
water is some sort of poison.
Boosting minerals with food
The first issue that arises is that distilled water is not only "empty"
of minerals but it also leaches minerals from the body, leading to severe
nutrient deficiencies over a prolonged period of time. Firstly, we should
look
to food rather than water to boost our mineral supply; the amount of
minerals per litre in spring water may be less than the equivalent in
a few peas!
Secondly, most fluids we take are hypotonic to blood (less concentrated/more
diluted than blood), so a high fluid intake will dilute the blood. The
kidneys will remove the excess fluid in order to maintain blood concentration.
If you drink a lot of water, regardless of where it comes from and how
it is prepared, then you will suffer mineral losses along with the fluid
via the kidneys. So drinking lots of any type of water will cause mineral
depletion.
Incidentally, the mineral depletion caused by soft drinks which use
distilled water in their manufacture is due to the high amount of phosphates
they contain, not the distilled water. This argument will be met with:
"But
distilled water is acidic and therefore has greater leaching power".
So a little lesson on acidic and alkaline water is called for.
Rainwater and mineral leaching
Rainwater is distilled water; it is formed through a process of evaporation
and condensation. As it falls it cleans the atmosphere, and being "empty
of solutes" it can take up either acid or alkaline substances.
Industrialised countries that burn fossil fuels belch sulphuric acid
into the atmosphere; the water picks this up and it falls as acid rain,
poisoning the land.
Rainwater that runs through limestone will leach calcium and magnesium
from the soils. This hardens the water and it becomes more alkaline.
However, water that runs through soils devoid of limestone will pick
up heavy metals such as copper.
For those living in "soft water" areas (or using tank water),
you may notice how the water leaches copper from your pipes, leaving
a blue discolouration on the porcelain. Very often we see high incidence
of heart and kidney
disease in soft water areas; it is not the water that causes the problem,
but the heavy metals it has leached.
Distilled water, or rain water, becomes acidic because it is "empty"
and able to take up carbon dioxide. Carbon dioxide, when mixed with
water, becomes carbonic acid; hence the water is "acidic".
However, most
distillation units have carbon filters and the freshly distilled water
picks up carbon as it runs through into the holding chamber. It is no
longer "empty" but now contains dissolved solids (often referred
to as TDS, total dissolved solids). This means that the water will not
take up carbon dioxide as it is no longer empty, therefore it will not
be acidic.
Some authors would have us believe that if you don't have a carbon filter
(and I would recommend that you get one), drinking distilled water is
akin to drinking neat acid.
Acidity in the system
The truth is that the body naturally produces huge amounts of acids
as metabolic waste. In fact, it produces 10.4 mmol of acid per minute
-- 6,500 times the amount held in the body at pH 7.4! So how can drinking
distilled water make you acidic? It doesn't.
There are two types of acidity in the body: the acidity produced from
stress and eating too much (particularly protein and refined foods),
and that produced from "clean" foods such as unrefined carbohydrates,
fruits
and vegetables. The kidneys remove the acidity from protein and stress
(sulphuric acid or non-volatile acids), while the lungs remove the acidity
produced from clean foods (carbonic acid or volatile acids).
Distilled water (if it hasn't been through a carbon filter) contains
carbonic acid, which is of no embarrassment to the body; it is simply
breathed off as carbon dioxide.
Of much greater danger are the non-volatile acids which take up to seven
days for the kidneys to eliminate. This means that acidity is cumulative;
and as we age or if our kidneys become impaired, then the true effects
of acidity start to manifest: the bones lose calcium in the buffering
of acidity, and the calcium then precipitates
outside the skeleton in the joints, arteries and soft tissues.
Acidity equals the hardening process that occurs as we age. Drinking
distilled water does not contribute to this in any shape or form.
Water energising
Finally, we come to the last objection that distilled water is dead.
Any water that has undergone any process has lost its vital force to
one degree or another.
Tap water is not only dead, but heavily contaminated with toxic chemicals.
Bottled water undergoes a pasteurisation process before it is commercially
available (this is not to mention the xeno-oestrogens that leach
from the plastic bottles). Boiling water to make your tea or coffee
"kills" the water.
Finding "living water" and drinking it at its source is not
an option that many have, so we are told that the next best option seems
to be "energising" the water with various gadgets and machines
that are available
today.
Advice on hydration
What do I recommend? The same as always!
• Ensure your intake of living nutrients from the food you eat.
• Don't throw the vegetable cooking water away – or, better
still, use the waterless cooking method.
• Drink freshly prepared juices which are full of enzymes and
nutrients.
• If you drink water, make sure first and foremost that it is
clean. If you wish to energise it, then feel free to do so. Don't overdo
the drinking of any water: it all leaches minerals. Two litres daily
of total fluid (including your vegetable juices) is generally enough.
• We need to be hydrated, but correctly hydrated. Drinking
water may not help you to hydrate if the tissues have lost their ability
to "hold" water. If this is the case, then you will pass water
as quickly as you have drunk it.
Eating foods that have a water-holding capacity – such as grains
and legumes and pectin-rich fruits, vegetables and juices – will
help build your hydration capacity, as these foods confer the same properties
to your
own body tissues.
Adding salt to water (as pioneered in Your Body's Many Cries for
Water, by F. Batmanghelidj, MD) will not rehydrate the body: it
will increase your thirst for more water, which you will retain. This
is akin to waterlogging.
And when that salt gets into the cells -- we all know the story -- it
acts as an enzyme inhibitor and increases intracellular acidity!
[Kathryn Alexander is a Maleny-based nutritional healing and detoxification
expert who is available for personal consultations and workshops. She
is the author of Get A Life: The Detoxification Diet Made Easy!,
which is available from Maple Street Co-op.
Kathryn can be contacted by phone on (07) 5435 8138 or 0414
702520 (mobile), or via her website at http://www.getalife.net.au.]
[From "Maple Street Co-op News", Jun/Jul 2004; published by
The Maple Street Co-operative Society Ltd, 37 Maple Street, Maleny,
Qld 4552, Australia, tel (07) 5494 2088, email maplest.coop@serv.net.au,
website http://www.maplestreetco-op.com.au]