Scientist and researchers worldwide have repeatedly demonstrated that long-term consumption of reverse osmosis water (RO) water is bad for your health.
June 7, 2014
Just about, everyone knows that Reverse Osmosis (RO) systems excel at removing water impurities, similar to distilled water they both take out the natural minerals in the water Asia and the European countries call it dead water, in some countries it is even banned, few are aware that they also remove the beneficial minerals. In fact, the reverse osmosis process removes 92-99% of beneficial calcium and magnesium. What is the big deal?
“Disease and early death is more likely to be seen with the long term drinking of distilled water, reverse osmosis water”. Zoltan P. Roma MD MSc, In other words reverse osmosis can cause death.
After analyzing hundreds of scientific studies concerning deminerialized or reverse osmosis water, the World Health Organization released a report stating that such water “has a definite adverse influence on the animal and human organism.”
Consumers have been so concerned with removing as many things from water as possible that they have forgotten to ask if the resulting water actually improves health or causes health problems. It is assumed that no toxins equals better health, but there is simply more to healthful water than a lack of toxins, as the World Health Organization clearly points out.
What is alarming is that consuming reverse osmosis water for even just a few months can create serious side effects. “The effects of most chemicals commonly found in drinking water manifest themselves after long exposure.” However “only a few months exposure may be sufficient ‘consumption time effects’ from water that is low in magnesium and/or calcium.
Illustrative of such short-term exposures are cases in the Czech and Slovak populations who began using reverse osmosis-based systems for final treatment of drinking water at their home taps in 2000-2002. Within several weeks or months various health complaints suggestive of acute magnesium (and possibly calcium) deficiency were reported.Among these complaints were cardiovascular disorders, tiredness, weakness or muscular cramps.” Again, serious side effects within just several weeks or months.
However, it gets even worse. Because reverse osmosis water does not have enough minerals, when it is consumed, it also leaches minerals from the body. This means that the minerals being consumed in food and vitamins are being urinated away. Less minerals consumed plus more minerals, being excreted equals serious negative side effects and big health problems. In a scientific study performed to see if minerals consumed in food can make up for the lack of minerals in reverse osmosis water, scientists concluded that “reduced mineral intake from water was not compensated by their diets…low-mineral water was responsible for an increased elimination of minerals from the body.”
“It has been adequately demonstrated that consuming water of low mineral content has a negative effect on homeostasis mechanisms, compromising the mineral and water metabolism in the body.” Consumption of reverse osmosis water “leads to the dilution of the electrolytes dissolved in the body water. Inadequate body water redistribution between compartments may compromise the function of vital organs. Side effects at the very beginning of this condition include tiredness, weakness and headache; more severe symptoms are muscular cramps and impaired heart rate.”
What about those reverse osmosis systems that add minerals back in?
One popular trend since the negative side effects of consuming reverse osmosis water emerged is the practice of adding minerals back into the reverse osmosis water. On this trend, the World Health Organization states that “possibly none of the commonly used ways of re-mineralization could be considered optimum, since the water does not contain all of its beneficial components. In the case of borderline deficiency of a given element, even the relatively low intake of the element with drinking water may play a relevant protective role.” It is practically impossible to recreate natural water with all of its minerals and trace elements from reverse osmosis treated water. Why risk the side effects of reverse osmosis water in any form if healthful alternatives are available?
Since the early 1960’s, epidemiological studies in many countries all over the world have reported that water low in calcium and magnesium is associated with increased morbidity and mortality from cardiovascular disease.
When used for cooking, reverse osmosis water was found to cause substantial losses of all essential elements from food (vegetables, meat, cereals). Such losses may reach up to 60 % for magnesium and calcium or even more for some other microelements (e.g., copper 66 %, manganese 70 %, cobalt 86 %). In contrast, when mineralized water is used for cooking, the loss of these elements is much lower, and in some cases, even higher calcium content was reported in food because of cooking.
In a multi-city study, women living in cities with low-mineral water more frequently showed cardiovascular changes (as measured by ECG), higher blood pressure, somatoform autonomic dysfunctions, headache, dizziness, and osteoporosis (as measured by X-ray absorptiometry) compared to those of cities with higher mineral content water.
The second website that drives a dagger into the RO industry myth that its pure water is healthy comes from the World Health Organization (W.H.O.). The WHO provides us with a Position Paper titled “The Health risks from drinking demineralized water” which was written by F. Kozisek. You can tell by the title where the article is headed.
Here is a link to the article:
The final report, published as an internal working document (WHO 1980), concluded that “not only does completely demineralised water (distillate) have unsatisfactory organoleptic properities, but it also has a definite adverse influence on the animal and human organism.”
Scientific testing and the best “unbiased” brains in the world have repeatedly demonstrated that long term consumption of demineralized (RO) water is bad for your health.
https://drinknatureswater.wordpress.com/2014/06/07/the-dangers-of-drinking-reverse-osmosis-water/
For the full WHO report read:
1. WHO report: Health Risks from Drinking Demineralised Water - MUST READ
2. Evaluating household water treatment options
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The following article is written by the International Water Association - it explains what reverse osmosis is. Contrary to the findings of the WHO report, it also says "Consumers should not be concerned about the removal of minerals by RO system". Here it is, for your consumption:
Reverse Osmosis will generally remove salt, manganese, iron, flouride, lead, and calcium (Binnie et. al., 2002). Most mineral constituents of water are physically larger than water molecules and they are trapped by the semi-permeable membrane and removed from drinking water when filtered through a RO (AllAboutWater.org, 2004). Meanwhile, consumers are concerned about the removal of minerals from their drinking water.
Reverse Osmosis Remove Minerals
Reverse Osmosis (RO) removed more than 90-99.99% of all the contaminants including minerals from the drinking water supply (see Figure 1). RO removes minerals because they have larger molecules than water. The subject of minerals and RO created controversy and disagreement among water and health professionals. The World Health Organization (WHO) made clarification that majority of healthy minerals are needed for human body is from food or dietary supplementary sources and not from drinking tap water. In addition, minerals found in water can be harmful to human health. The evidence is strong that calcium and magnesium are essential elements for human body (WQA, 2011).
However, its a weak argument to suggest that we should make up this deficiency through water consumption (WQA, 2011). Tap water presents a variety of inorganic minerals which human body has difficulty absorbing (Misner, 2004). Their presence is suspect in a wide array of degenerative diseases, such as hardening of the arteries, arthritis, kidney stones, gall stones, glaucoma, cataracts, hearing loss, emphysema, diabetes, and obesity. What minerals are available, especially in "hard" tap water, are poorly absorbed, or rejected by cellular tissue sites, and, if not evacuated, their presence may cause arterial obstruction, and internal damage (Dennison, 193; Muehling, 1994; Banik, 1989).
However, its a weak argument to suggest that we should make up this deficiency through water consumption (WQA, 2011). Tap water presents a variety of inorganic minerals which human body has difficulty absorbing (Misner, 2004). Their presence is suspect in a wide array of degenerative diseases, such as hardening of the arteries, arthritis, kidney stones, gall stones, glaucoma, cataracts, hearing loss, emphysema, diabetes, and obesity. What minerals are available, especially in "hard" tap water, are poorly absorbed, or rejected by cellular tissue sites, and, if not evacuated, their presence may cause arterial obstruction, and internal damage (Dennison, 193; Muehling, 1994; Banik, 1989).
Figure 1. Reverse Osmosis Membrane (Source:DOI-BUR, 2009)
Organic Minerals vs. Inorganic Minerals
There are two types of minerals in water, organic and inorganic. Human physiology has a biological affinity for organic minerals. Most organic minerals for our body functions come from dietary plant foods (Misner, 2004). A growing plant converts the inorganic minerals from the soils to a useful organic mineral (Misner, 2004). When an organic mineral (from a plant food) enters the stomach it must attach itself to a specific protein-molecule (chelation) in order to be absorbed, then it gains access to the tissue sites where it is needed (Misner, 2004). Once a plant mineral is divested within the body, it is utilized as a coenzyme for composing body fluids, forming blood and bone cells, and the maintaining of healthy nerve transmission (Balch & Balch 1990).
Reverse Osmosis has Little Affect on Water pH
Water pH levels will automatically change when it is ingested and comes into contact with the food in your stomach (Wise, 2011). Even on an empty stomach, your stomach acid alone is already several times more acidic than RO water (pH 6-8) with a pH level of 2 (Wise, 2011). The human body regulates pH levels constantly to find balance and equilibrium (see Figure 2). Therefore under normal conditions it will always maintain a neutral 7.4 pH balance (Wise, 2011).
The healthy body is very robust and it will restore homeostatic pH fairly quickly and easily (Wise 2011). Soft drinks and sports drinks typically have a pH level of 2.5, orange juice has a 3 pH and coffee has a 4 pH level and we drink these beverages all the time without problems (Wise, 2011).
The healthy body is very robust and it will restore homeostatic pH fairly quickly and easily (Wise 2011). Soft drinks and sports drinks typically have a pH level of 2.5, orange juice has a 3 pH and coffee has a 4 pH level and we drink these beverages all the time without problems (Wise, 2011).
Figure 2. Comparison of pH Levels (Source: Wise, 2011)
Conclusion
Water filtered or treated by RO is pure, clean, and healthy. RO treatment system is currently the only technology that can remove most of the emerging contaminants (i.e., prescription drugs and perchlorate) including other contaminants (i.e., Arsenic, Cyanide, and Fluoride) that are difficult to remove by other treatment methods. No more ingesting of harmful inorganic minerals means the body will no longer be stressed with trying to absorb something that wasn't supposed to be there in the first place (Wise, 2011). Consumers should not be concerned about the removal of minerals by RO system. WHO (2009) and WQA (2011) pointed out, that the human body obtains vast majority of minerals from food or supplements, not from drinking water.
https://www.iwapublishing.com/news/reverse-osmosis-and-removal-minerals-drinking-water
Note: The above article is by the International Water Association.
Note: The above article is by the International Water Association.
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