Causes of Cancer
On fluoride causing/contributing to cancer & other diseases (4)
HOW CAN WE GET PURE, CLEAN WATER?
ctd. from On Fluoride and Fluoridation Causing Cancer & Other Diseases Part 3
First page
OTHER CONTAMINANTS
Chlorine and fluoride are added on purpose to the water. We haven't even mentioned the millions of tons of industrial pollutants that sneak into the earth's water supply every year. To give just one small example, Congress did a study in 1979 of the extent of industrial pollution between 1950 and 1970. They verified just a part of what was actually dumped into America's water supply: the top 14% of industrial polluters discharged 1.5 trillion pounds of industrial wastes into the water supply in that 20 year period.
What about the other 86%?
Think it's improved since 1970? Consider this:
The only federal agency for ensuring clean drinking water is the EPA. In 1997, after the cryptosporidium deaths in Milwaukee and Las Vegas, Clinton tried to upgrade the provisions of the 1986 Safe Drinking Water Act. But the EPA only regulates some chemicals — there are thousands of chemical pollutants in the water!
And the states are individually claiming that complying with the restrictions on just those 60 are "too expensive" because they just don't have the money. Most water systems are operating on very old designs with inadequate capacity. (Kupua A'o, p16)
As a result, in 1991–1992 alone, the EPA reported over 250,000 violations of the Safe Drinking Water Act, affecting more than 100 million Americans. (Natural Resources Defense Council) For those 250,000 violations, guess on how many the EPA took enforcement action. Just guess. About 600.
Looks like we're on our own out here.
HOW CAN WE GET PURE, CLEAN WATER?
The tap water in this country seems to have a few problems:
- organochlorines
- fluoride
- PCBs
- THMs
- heavy metals
- resistant biologicals
You'd think that since we created the problem, we could fix it. But even if Greenpeace or someone took over the government of the world tomorrow and stopped all further pollution tonnage, it would be years, decades before the water would be like it was before the Industrial Revolution. These contaminants will be around for centuries. By now everyone knows what the concept of half-life means.
...
So what can we do?
Don't drink the tap water for starters. But does that also mean don't wash vegetables, make ice cubes, or cook with tap water? Yes, it does, because heat doesn't destroy fluoride, heavy metals, or other contaminants. Remember the word bioaccumulative.
So the first step is
BOTTLED WATER
That's right — drag it home from the market every week. Or the 5-gallon bottle from the water store. Is that safe enough? Maybe. Who knows? You have to trust two groups of people in order to be sure:
— the regulating agencies
— the sellers
Water stores sell reverse osmosis water — no minerals. Bottled water is only as good as the monitoring system in place. Step right up.
FILTERS
"Buy a filter or be a filter." That's one company's slogan.
Today there is enough grassroots consciousness about the dangers of tap water that cheap carbon filters are now available in any hardware store which attach easily to the kitchen faucet.
It is likely that such filters get rid of most of the chlorine — for a while. But to really get the resistant biologicals, the fluoride, heavy metals, and other contaminants, the customer may consider one of the high-end drinking water filters. These cost between two and four hundred dollars and come in models for both over and under the sink.
Names like Alpine, MultiPure, and Spectrapure are among the dozens of brand names that have come along during the past 20 years. Multipure seems to be far out front at this time. Everyone claims to be the best, of course, but we can find some important similarities in their advertising. When you begin to compare the better water filters, you notice common concerns:
- chlorine
- THMs
- chloriform
- chloramines
- cryptosporidium and giardia lamblia cysts
- fluoride
- pesticides and toxic chemicals
- heavy metals
- minerals
- MTBEs
- nitrates
Killing microbials is not a big deal since most of that's been done by chlorine. Most contaminants are removed by the better filters. The problem when choosing a filter seems to come down to four main concerns: fluoride, minerals, THMs, and nitrates.
Difficult to find one filter that does everything: many reverse osmosis filters take out most contaminants, but also the healthy minerals. Many of the high-end carbon filters will not remove fluoride or nitrates, but leave the healthy minerals.
Fluoride is obviously a biggie. Find out if the filter you are about to buy removes fluoride, and what percentage. After what we've learned about fluoride, we should expect a filter to remove it, wouldn't you say? Problem is: the demand. Due to fluoridiot propaganda, most Americans don't even realize fluoride is bad, and therefore don't think about it when considering a water filter.
NSF is a third-party non-profit testing agency that has been rating water filters for the past 50 years. Always ask — is it NSF-certified? For what? Don't be fooled if they say "NSF-tested.' Big difference.
Minerals is an area of some controversy. You've got the hard water / soft water debate. Hard water has more minerals in it, which obviously is better for the bones and teeth, and probably for the heart as well.
That makes sense, although as we saw in the Minerals chapter, elemental minerals are the least absorbed of all types. Elemental means from rocks, and that's the kind that would be in spring water, and therefore in filtered water, except for reverse osmosis. In my opinion, hard water is better than distilled.
Most naturopaths and holistic nutritionists don't like distilled water because they say it leaches minerals from the bones and teeth. In general, that seems logical, although Dr. Y says it doesn't make any difference unless the person is extremely malnourished.
The truth is, no formal studies comparing distilled with mineral water have been done, so it's all pretty theoretical. But thinking about the Hunzas and their 120-year lifespan that was attributed to the glacial mineral waters they drank, one can see the value of minerals in drinking water.
A high-end water filter should take this discussion into consideration and give reasons about the importance or unimportance of filtering out certain minerals.
Comes down to a choice: reverse osmosis or carbon block. With reverse osmosis you've got no fluoride filtration, no minerals, and wasting about 4–9 gallons to get one gallon of pure water. (A'o, p72) With most high-end carbon mesh filters, you can get rid of everything but fluoride, and you'll still have minerals.
These are questions for the filter sales force. Make "em dance for you. Caveat emptor — only 5 states have any regulations about what water filter manufacturers can say. On the Internet — it's a total jungle!
There is one excellent little book which can save a lot of research time: Don't Drink the Water. The author goes into great detail in comparing the attributes and quality of the basic filter units. He points out the advantages of placing a KDF filter before the carbon filter in order to insure that bacteria won't begin to grow within the carbon.
Bottom line in my opinion, if you want to solve the whole filtration question, just buy a Multipure and put in under the sink. (1 831 763 1967)
Copyright MMIV
Read the unabriged very detailed WATER article discussing among other subjects ”Acid/alkaline, Tap water, Chlorine, and Filters at Dr. Tim O’Shea’s information-rich https://thedoctorwithin.com/Water/. Extensive excerpts at Fluoride and cancer (and other illnesses) ff .
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