I can’t begin to tell you how much pleasure it gives me to write this article. I will never forget being severly chastized a few years ago by a senior executive of a company that sells thousands of RO systems per year for “not knowing what I’m talking about”. He informed me that my challenge to him and the industry about RO water being unhealthy was “preposterous”. At the time of the meeting I was not equipped to fend off his accusations because I hadn’t put in the research that I have now.
I never believed the RO industry claim that the human body couldn’t absorb inorganic molecules anyway. Most of the supplements that are available on the market are inorganic, which means that either the RO industry was protecting its “ass-ets” or the entire supplement industry was a scam.
The RO industry has been disseminating inaccurate information for years. Doctors and other health care professionals have unwittingly been endorsing the “RO water is the best drinking water” message for years which makes the myth worse because we trust these people with our health.
I have conducted dozens of interviews with RO system owners and sales people, and they all take some form of magnesium and calcium supplements. Why is it that they take the supplements when their story is that your body can’t absorb the calcium and magnesium that is found in most source waters.
Proof that RO water is unhealthy
I have conducted dozens of interviews with RO system owners and sales people, and they all take some form of magnesium and calcium supplements. Why is it that they take the supplements when their story is that your body can’t absorb the calcium and magnesium that is found in most source waters.
I offer two sources of evidence that unequivically reveal the fact that the water produced by RO systems is bad for your health if you drink the water over the long term.
The American government’s online health website www.pubmed.gov is an arm of the National Institutes of Health. I spent several long days poring over numerous studies related to the ability of the human body to absorb inorganic elements such as Calcium and Magnesium. I managed to find 14 scientific studies on the site that provide irrefutable evidence that the human body can and does absorb inorganic matter.
The bottom line of what I learned from reviewing the studies is that your body typically absorbs anywhere from 6% to 30% of its daily requirement of essential elements from tap water. In a world where our soil is virtually devoid of nutrients from too many crops and not enough recovery time, and where diets are anything but healthy, it is very important to your long term health that you ingest calcium and magnesium from drinking water.
A second website that drives a dagger into the RO industry myth that 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.
Here is a link to the article: http://www.who.int/water_sanitation_health/dwq/nutdemineralized.pdf
Here are some of the highlights from 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.”
The potential for adverse health effects from long term consumption of demineralised water is of interest not only in countries lacking adequate fresh water but also in countries where demineralizing home water treatment systems are widely used or demineralized bottled water is consumed.
In 2004, the WHO provided recommendations for drinking water:
* For magnesium, a minimum of 10 mg/l (Novikov et al. 1983; Rubenowitz et al. 2000) and an optimum of about 20-30 mg/l (Durlach et al. 1989; Kozisek 1992);
* For calcium, a minimum of 20 mg/l (Novikov et al. 1983) and an optimum of about 50 (40-80) mg/l (Rakhmanin et al. 1990; Kozisek 1992);
* For total water hardness, the sum of calcium and magnesium should be 2 to 4 mmol/l (Plitman et al. 1989; Lutai 1992; Muzalevskaya et al. 1993; Golubev and Zimin 1994).
At these concentrations, minimum or no adverse health effects were observed. The maximum protective or beneficial health effects of drinking water appeared to occur at the estimated desirable or optimum concentrations. The recommended magnesium levels were based on cardiovascular system effects, while changes in calcium metabolism and ossification were used as a basis for the recommended calcium levels
Summary of the research:
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.
What to do if you are drinking demineralized “RO” water?
Before doing anything, you should test the water that comes out of your RO unit once per year to make sure it is working properly.
You can remineralize your RO water by adding a remin filter to your RO system to make it healthy, OR, you can take calcium and magnesium supplements. Many remin filters are available online which introduce calcium and magnesium into the water. The ideal remin filter contains elemental magnesium, because the action of water running across the magnesium will create hydrogen gas which is incredibly healthy for you. I can’t over-emphasize the importance of drinking hydrogen rich water as it may be the single most important health tip you will ever read. Please take some time to read up about molecular hydrogen gas (H2) on my blog.
What if I don’t have a water filter system in your house?
If you are not sure what is in your water, get it tested, especially if your water comes from a well or a lake which isn’t sanitized. Drinking water is so important to your health that you should never take it for granted.
If you receive your drinking water from a municipality, the water is probably safe to drink. However, there could be one or more contaminants that should be removed from municipally supplied drinking water and most of them can be removed by inexpensive filter systems.
If your drinking water contains fluoride, you can buy a ceramic filter which does a pretty good job (removes about 85% of fluoride versus about 92% to 95% for RO systems) for up to 6 months and 50% for the following 6 months. Forget buying an activated alumina filter to remove fluoride. The marketing claims greatly exceed the actual performance despite what you will read on websites trying to sell you an activated alumina solution.
If your drinking water contains contaminants that can’t be reliably removed by basic filter systems, you may need to get a RO system, but remember to remineralize.
What should I be looking for in a drinking water system?
It is all about clean and healthy when it comes to water. Clean is simple to understand as it is about removing contaminants. Healthy water starts with the inclusion of magnesium and calcium content, but healthy water can be taken to a whole other level. Adding molecular hydrogen (H2) to water has been identified as contributing health benefits to more than 170 diseases by more approximately 700 scientific studies and review papers.
Should I be looking at buying a hydrogen water system?
Absolutely.
The downside of buying a hydrogen water system is that they are expensive. An argument can be made that “what is your health worth” but many people have priorities that don’t include an expensive drinking water system.
The good news is that the makers of good hydrogen water machines sell for about $2,000 which is less (or a lot less) than leading alkaline water ionizers despite being vastly superior to alkaline water ionizers at generating hydrogen rich water.
Where can you buy H2 products?
You can also do a Google search of molecular hydrogen (H2) to find a number of sites that sell H2 products.
The best site by far to buy H2 products is www.brilliantz.com.
You should be asking yourself: “Why is this guy touting a specific website” and you would be right to question my motive.
I know the people at Brilliantz. They sell good high quality H2 products and they are good people. That is well and fine, but the reason for my overwhelming endorsement is that they recently changed their business model from selling through an Affiliate network to selling directly to the public. The net result of the change is that they reduced their prices by 50%.
Brilliantz doesn’t pay any commissions or referral fees. I’m giving Brilliantz my full support as you will be hard pressed to find anyone who recommends Brilliantz due to the fact that there is zero financial incentive to do so. I don’t have a problem with that as I have never used WaterFYI as a source of income.
Thanks for reading
Hi Rob,
I love to read the strange comments that some people make regarding water.
Truly Bull S*** baffles brains.
You can convince so many ignorant people (including supposed intelligent) about anything if you are “convincing” in your statements.
From the beginning of time, water was only found underground.
Water has an incredible property in that it absorbs minerals as it travels underground.
When we poison the ground, that is easily absorbed by water.
When you take out the minerals from the water (R O) you then find that as you drink that R O water, essential minerals are leached from your body……..make sense?
R O water is used in some factories for cleaning off stubborn dirt by eating away the dirt and leaving the cleaned part in tact in contrast to acid.
I can assure you that if God created R O water for us to drink the world would be in a sad state.
I would like to end with a fact to consider……
Our bodies are 90% water (not 60%)
We can live without food for 40 days before dying.
We can only live for 3 days without water……….
What does that tell you about what God created.
I would love to hear your comments (valid)
Hi Rob. I know some years ago you wrote, but so far the best information about RO water, that I have read. I have re- rewritten my recommendations about minerals. I sell RO water filters since 2011 in Denmark.
Again: super article, thank you so much
Regards from Denmark
Hi Michael:
RO machines serve a very important function all over the world in that they make virtually any source water safe to drink. Adding Ca and Mg supplements will take care of any potential deficiency caused by long term use of RO water.
So I guess that means Rainwater and distilled water is bad for you too? Silly people…. C’mon! Did you actually read the references in this W.H.O. article? So I guess the entire US military is unhealthy and weak then because of all the RO water they have drank for 40 years? What is wrong with people?
Hi Capt:
RO water is a life saver in many parts of the world. Drinking RO water doesn’t make you weak but drinking RO water will slowly deplete your body of Ca and Mg over time unless you supplement. I’m sure the US military makes sure their soldiers intake salt and essential minerals to maintain their health. It is a simple and necessary process to offset the cleaning function of RO systems.
Oh one other thing? Osmosis is a VERY “Natural” process, as cells do it DAILY. I wish people would stop trying to scare people on RO water. It clogs up the information requests coming through the military for those that have serious health questions and concerns which makes it difficult to help our Soldiers in need.
Hi Again:
The human body has virtually nothing in common with a RO membrane. Water enters human cells through microtubules one at a time.
If the military is getting calls from concerned personnel, I suggest the military take time to learn a little about water and then make that information readily available.
New link to WHO paper: http://www.who.int/water_sanitation_health/dwq/nutrientsindw.pdf .
Dont drink RO water !!!!!
Im drinking ro water since 3 years and now me and my wife have several joint pain issue . I have tremendous lower back pain that i cant sleep.at night due to it . My doctor said because of lower level of calcium in my body .when the medicinces got over pain start again . Now i have started filtering water by cloths and old water filter now everything is fine …… i want to sell my RO ON 90% discount if you want contact me …. 😊
RO is the only filtration that can effectively remove tds & most harmful impurities. It is not suitable to drink pure ro water as it will cause stress to kidney, gastric and body aching.
However, without ro, it is impossible to generate clean water. Base on our experience, best combination water system will be ro+natural alkaline minerals+hydrogen. This is really a perfect system that can really boost immunity n improve overall health. However, the final tds of purified water should be maintained between 40ppm to 60ppm so that essential minersls such as calcium, magnesium, potassium etc are present as they r key minerals to human and these minerals will create natural alkaline water. To maintain optimum tds, 8 stages filters will be required. First 3 pre ro filters + ro + 4x post ro natural alkaline minerals filters. (Natural alkaline filters can be coral stones, maifan stones, tourmaline neg ion ceremic balls, magnesium minerals balls, etc) . With this spec, it will generate clean and nutritious healthy water similar to mountain spring.
I was on board with everything you were saying until you started your sales pitch. As soon as you mentioned the need for 8 stages, you lost me because the same levels can because I have worked on and tested systems with 3 filters that achieve the same results.