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Monday, 25 December 2017

Does RO Purified water really making us healthy?

Hi Friends
As we all know that, Water plays a significant role in humans' life, nearly 60 percent of the human body is made up of water & we can't live for more than a few days without water.
Water acts as both a solvent and a delivery mechanism, by virtue of dissolving essential vitamins and nutrients from food and delivering them to each cell of our body. Water also helps to flush out toxins, regulate body temperature and aid our metabolism.
In Short, we can say that “water is the elixir of the life”.
But in today’s scenario, Limited availability of fresh water and its increased requirement has led to an increased use of personal, domestic and commercial methods of purification of water such as RO.
So in this article, we will try to investigate issues related to the RO Purifier & its effect on our health.
Today it is very fancy to have a portable RO purifier for domestic purpose as well without knowing the fact about their method of working & their effect on our health.

*What is RO method of water purification?

In RO method of water purification, RO stands for “Reverse osmosis” which is basically a liquid filtering process.
In this process, a contaminated water(liquid) is forced to pass through a semi-permeable membrane that blocks most of the dissolved contaminants. The RO purified water is also called  “Demineralized water”.

Reverse osmosis process in RO Purifier
Reverse osmosis Process

Note: This process is called “Reverse osmosis” because in “osmosis”. A less-concentrated water(liquid) passes into a high-concentrated water(Liquid).
Most of the people know only this much about RO water purifier & unaware of the facts such as:
*Are all contaminants in water is really bad for our health?
*Do you know the PH of RO purified water?
*Are these RO purifier really serves the healthiest option?
*Do they equally necessary for different geographical location?
*……
In short

*Does RO Purified water really making us healthy?

As we know that reverse osmosis (R.O.) water purification method involves forcing water through a semi-permeable membrane.
Surely this semi-permeable membrane filters out dissolved impurities such as salt, lead, manganese, iron, and calcium, & certain chemicals. 
It is also effective in reducing an array of water contaminants such as fluoride; 
but during filtration, this RO filtration process also removes naturally occurring minerals from the water that are essential to health, such as calcium and magnesium in terms of demineralized water.
Note: For health calcium and magnesium are both essential elements.
Demineralised water that has not been remineralized is considered an extreme case of low-mineral or soft water because it contains only small amounts of dissolved minerals such as calcium and magnesium that are the major contributors to hardness.
According to WHO this demineralized water can led to various adverse health issues in animal & human.
This filtration process cannot remove various other contaminants such as volatile organic chemicals (VOCs), chlorine and chlorine by-products, pharmaceuticals and a wide array of man-made chemicals.
*PH of water is defined as Neutral pH which is 7.00, but RO water typically shows a pH of between 5.00 and 6.00.
Because RO membranes will reject dissolved ions but not dissolved gases, this will result in removal of alkaline chemicals with buffering properties(the chemicals which resists the change in pH) 
with the acid causing gasses remaining.
The pH drop is usually largest for waters with high amounts of HCO3 ions.
According to the study published in the journal of the national center for biotechnology when this Demineralized soft low ph water is used for cooking is known 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%).
I know that from the above discussion various question will suddenly pop up in your mind such as;
*Shall we avoid water purifier?
*Is there any solution of Deminarilazid water?
*What should we do with that low Ph water?

So now let’s have a look at solution aspects.

To resolve these issues again you have to use your brain for beauty.
There are various other methods of water purification other than RO you can opt them for the same purpose.
But in case you still want to continue with that RO purifier you have to compensate those minerals by having nutrients rich diet.
There is nearly 21 mineral known to be essential for humans. In which fourteen minerals are clinically acclaimed as being essential for good health. These essential nutrients in combined can serve various health benefits such as
* Ca, P, Mg, F for bone and membrane structure,
*Na, K, Cl for water and electrolyte balance in the body,
* Zn, Cu, Se, Mg, Mn, Mo works in metabolic catalysis,
* Fe for oxygen binding,
* I, Cr for proper hormone functions.

So you must have to incorporate these essential nutrients into your diet to stay healthy & beautiful.
In short, follow well balanced “80/20 rule of alkaline diet”. 

Conclusion:

By virtue of this article, I don’t want to discourage the use of water purifier but certainly, want to alarm you by showing the darker side of Demineralised RO water & it's long-term side effects when no counterbalancing step is been taken.
You can write your suggestion as well as your query in the comment section or at prajsanjivani@gmail.com.

Thanks
Ms. P Rajeshwari
(Aromatherapist)
Diet & Beauty Consultant



Next post topic:

Can your drinking water be your medicine?