Aug
13
2014

Pure Water A Necessity

By | Infectious Disease, Nutrition, Prevention

Water has been in the news a lot: there has been the Toledo, Ohio incident affecting 400,000 residents because toxins of algae from Lake Erie entered into the public water system. At about the same time in northern British Columbia, Canada there was a broken dam from a mining company’s toxic wastewater reservoir spilling toxic wastewater into the Fraser River drinking water system.

Between 60 and 70% of our bodies are made up of water. We need water for a multitude of biochemical reactions that constantly take place within us. We need water to “run the engine”. This includes detoxification of our bodies as water is a large part of our kidney excretions (urine) and still is a significantly percentage of our stools. Water is the basis for our blood circulation.

Having said all this it is important that we insist only drinking pure water. In the following I will describe why this can be a problem and how to solve this problem.

Brief history of water purification

The first sand filter for water purification was developed in Scotland by a private company in 1804.

Based on this success, the Chelsea Waterworks Company in London in 1829 was founded, which was the first public water supply in the world. When a  choleraepidemic hit London in 1854, physician Dr. Snow discovered that cholera was confined to those districts in London where water was not purified and he provided the authorities with a dot map depicting the cholera cases in London, which correlated with the water system that used no filtration methods. When the pumps were switched off in this district of London, the cholera epidemic subsided.

Europe adopted the English model in the late 1800’s and added sewage treatment plants in order to separate wastewater from drinking water. The first sewage treatment plant was built in Frankfurt in 1887. This was necessary because of huge epidemics of cholera and typhoid fever that swept through Europe. When separation of sewage and drinking water was achieved, these epidemics stopped.

It is interesting that minimal water standards were introduced in the US only in 1914 and it took until 1940 before water purity was legislated federally.

Pure Water A Necessity

Pure Water A Necessity

Toxins in water

Townships have to get the drinking water they pipe into your house from somewhere. Often this is a lake, an artesian well or several artesian wells combined; in the past it was from rivers, but they are now mostly contaminated with sewage and chemicals.

There is the added problem that natural soil compositions vary tremendously throughout a country, so that arsenic is found very high in some parts of the world and the drinking water can be high in arsenic in those places.

Arsenic is contained naturally in soils of some areas, so-called “hot spots“.

It follows from here that some springs can also be contaminated with arsenic and other heavy metals. Heavy metals poison our internal enzyme systems and interfere with the body’s metabolism.

A well is more likely to contain arsenic than a river or lake as a water source. But we do not only concern ourselves with toxins; viruses and bacteria are also a problem.

Bacterial and viral contamination

In Europe, before cities built sewage systems it was not uncommon that excrements from humans and animals found their way into the well that was used for drinking water. We like to think that we are safe now with all of the laws and measures in place, but the various news stories teach us otherwise. Common bacterial contaminants are Salmonella, E.coli (strain O157:H7), Giardia lamblia, Legionella, the parasite Cryptosporidium and others.

In Canada there was a tragic incident in 2000 where thousands of residents of Walkerton, a small town in Ontario were exposed to E.coli (strain O157:H7). This was due to a chlorination unit that was not working, but those who were responsible for water quality maintenance were denying it and were not even properly trained to run the chlorination equipment.

Water testing

Water testing is at the beginning of any water purification system and intermittent ongoing testing is at the center of monitoring water quality on a permanent basis. Water inspectors need to constantly monitor the water source, the water purification process and the delivery system.

Many people in rural Canadian or US towns depend on well water. The same logic is true for water quality with regard to well water as it is for municipal water; just it is on a smaller scale.

You want to know what your water is like. It is not difficult to find out: take a water sample and have it analyzed at a water company. Depending on the result the water company will advise you what kind of filter you will need.

The first purification stage typically is an activated carbon filter that removes organic compounds, radon and other impurities. Every three or four days the filter automatically backwashes and cleans itself for about 45 minutes. Once a year the activated carbon has to be removed and replaced by a new filter. This type of filter is also useful for people who are on municipal water, but want to remove the halogens (fluoride, bromide, chloride) used to disinfect municipal water.

The second stage is an ultraviolet irradiation device. This disinfects the water just prior to coming to your water tap from any bacteria, viruses or parasites.

It is recommended that you also install a reverse osmosis system under your main kitchen sink. It will provide you with purified drinking water. Water produced by this filter goes through additional activated carbon filters and finally must pass through a porous membrane where only water can pass through, but heavy metals and other impurities will not. During an outbreak of Cryptosporidium in 1996 in Kelowna, BC those who had a reverse osmosis system were safe from this pathogen.

You can brush your teeth with confidence with reverse osmosis water, even if your drinking water is contaminated.

Proper water purification

If you are on municipal water, find out what system the municipality is using to ensure water safety. Usually there is a first step of a slow sand filter, where the raw water is first purified, then it undergoes a water chlorination, bromination or fluoridation process, which is done to remove bacteria and viruses. We know, however from a series of outbreaks of Cryptosporidium gastroenteritis cases in municipalities that only used this two stage purification process, that a third step, namely ultraviolet germicidal irradiation, is also necessary to eradicate this microscopic parasite.

Cryptosporidium was the problem behind a drinking water problem in the summer of 1996 in Kelowna, BC, the town of the interior of BC, Canada where I live. 50,000 residents had to get their drinking water from water trucks that were parked at certain locations of the town (about 40% of the population was affected by this water problem). Kelowna now has a modern ultraviolet irradiation system in place.

Immune system compromised people

People whose immune system is compromised such as AIDS patients or patients who had chemotherapy for cancer are very susceptible to Cryptosporidium and other parasites, bacteria and viruses. For them it is particularly important that the third stage, the ultraviolet irradiation step be part of the municipal water treatment process. If this is missing, have a home unit installed by a water company.

Conclusion

It is interesting to see how in Europe the history of water purification has been tightly linked to the history of cholera and typhoid fever epidemics; the quest for learning from these mistakes of the past has brought new solutions. The mistake in the past had been that in water sources wastewater contaminated the drinking water sources. To our modern thinking this seems unimaginable. But recent events that we read about in the news remind us that we cannot be lax on water purification. It is a reality that the same mistakes from the past are still sporadically made now! Know your water source; know the water quality of the water you brush your teeth with (for instance use only bottled water for this in Mexico). Remember that in many development countries to which you may travel there is no clear separation of drinking water and wastewater and there may not be a three-phase filtration system in place that I described above.

Enjoy drinking your clean, refreshing clean water until I meet you again in another blog.

More information on gastroenteritis (from unclean water): http://nethealthbook.com/digestive-system-and-gastrointestinal-disorders/gastroenteritis-food-poisoning/

Last edited Nov. 8, 2014

May
31
2014

Industry Sponsored Diet Soda Study Deceptive

By | Health, Hormones, Nutrition, Prevention, Vitamins and supplements, Weight loss

Recently an industry sponsored study was reviewed by the media with this headline: “Diet soda helps weight loss, industry-funded study finds”. Before you get too excited about this study, let me tell you that you are being deceived. Essentially the study compared 150 overweight or obese people on water and a similar group of people on diet sodas. Both groups were counselled on the benefits of exercise and a healthier diet. At the end of 12 weeks the water group that did not drink diet sodas had lost 9 pounds, while the diet soda group that continued their former habit lost 13 pounds. The question now is why this 4 pound difference? The sponsor of the study would like you to think that the soda diet drink is healthier, because it helps you to lose weight. Let me explain to you that there are a few flaws in the study as follows.

1. Most often there are confounding errors in industry-sponsored studies. Even though it looks on the surface that the two groups were comparable, researchers should have checked out various parameters like sex distribution, other underlying illnesses, mental state (depressed or not etc.), diabetes and other factors to make sure that there is no metabolic bias between the two groups from the start of the study.

2. Deception built into study: we know from other studies that on the long-term diet sodas lead to weight gain by stimulating your appetite for sweets and their subsequent consumption. Often short-term studies show the opposite effect, so it would be false to assume that long-term results would be similar. But most readers who read this quickly would be tempted to think “so it must be OK to continue to consume diet soda drinks!” Off you go to the grocery store and buy another 6 or 12 pack. That’s exactly what the industry-sponsored study set out to do. Somewhere in the back-room of a big soft drink corporation the executives discussed among themselves that their statistics were bad; the sales of diet soft drinks were down; there was too much negative press fuelled by the health food industry. They had to do something about this, so they designed a study where the good guy was the diet soft drink. If the consumer is not buying the results, at least the study helped to confuse people and whenever there is confusion, at least part of the confused population will return to their old habits. After all the study showed “ it is OK”.

Industry Sponsored Diet Soda Study Deceptive

Industry Sponsored Diet Soda Study Deceptive

3. Excitotoxins are not OK. Unfortunately all artificial sweeteners are toxic to your brain, they are excitotoxins. MSG is another excitotoxin. The only exception is the natural sweetener stevia, a plant product, which is OK. Splenda is an insecticide, so this is belongs to the xenoestrogens, bad for you as it acts like a foreign estrogen and has cancer-promoting qualities when exposed to it for several decades. The rest of the artificial sweeteners are excitotoxins: they burn your brain cells very slowly and can lead to dementia. Unfortunately they are addicting and your brain will make you feel good when you drink more of it. So, the real reason why the study group on diet sodas did better than the water group is because they did not have to change that habit, there was no withdrawal to deal with and they felt fine. So they could concentrate on dieting and exercising and of course you would lose 13 pounds in 12 weeks doing that. The water group on the other hand had to cope with diet soda withdrawal and on top was challenged by an exercise and weight loss program. As there was no diet restriction, they could compensate a bit for their trouble of withdrawal and eat a few muffins or some extra bread to make up for the lack of their comfort diet drink fix (the satisfaction of consuming the excitotoxin). This slick short-term study design is what should have alarmed the publisher to ask a few hard questions.

4. There needs to be an internal logic in the study: Let’s do a thought experiment where we repeat the study and start with two comparable overweight/obese groups of people and put them on no sugar and no refined carbs for 2 weeks and also on no diet sodas for the same time. After two weeks they are both accustomed to this diet and the no diet soda habit and they have probably lost the same amount of weight from the calorie restriction. Now we start the one group on diet sodas and the other group on water, but strictly controlled for a similar calorie intake in terms of other foods or drinks as much as is humanly possible. I would predict that after 12 weeks the water group will have at least lost the same weight as the diet soda group, if not more. The diet soda group likely will have had some problems with sugar craving and may have had more dietary indiscretions (sneaking in snacks and underreporting them), but this would show up as weight gain.

You may be proud of having completed this well controlled study. The trouble is that your industry sponsor that produces the diet drinks will not like this outcome and would not allow the results to be published. In fact that kind of result would be actively suppressed.

Conclusion:

The diet soda study discussed here is a lesson in biased publishing. We are constantly bombarded by an endless string of meaningless publications that are designed to make the consumer insecure, or bias us for accepting a company’s product in the hope of achieving a certain result (like high sales). Even, if this is not accomplished the company has sold enough of their product just for giving it a try. Beware of the door-to-door sales person. This figure is very much present right in this publication. In this case it is the sales pitch of the diet soda manufacturers! You are looking at a study that was designed to make you buy more of the excitotoxin (aspartame or other artificial sweeteners), which likely contributed to your extra weight or obesity in the first place. It’s up to you to shut the door on this sales pitch. Instead of a diet soda I suggest you make your own drink: squeeze half an organic lemon and top this with mineral water of your choice. Sweeten it with a tiny amount of stevia. This has no calories and does not stimulate you to eat more sugar and starchy foods; but it quenches any thirst and you even get some water-soluble vitamins in the process.

Last edited May 31, 2014

Dec
28
2013

Airplane Food And Airport Food, A Personal Travel Experience

By | Diabetes, Health, Heart Disease, High Blood Pressure, Nutrition, Prevention

Travelling for pleasure is usually something we eagerly anticipate: it can associate with a long wished for vacation, meeting family and friends, enjoying a different environment, in short: there is a bit of adventure attached to it.

Getting something to eat while you are in transit, however, can be a different story. Let me share a recent experience that my wife and I had on a transcontinental flight.

We had to get up shortly after 4 AM, and knowing that we would be in transit till later that evening we decided to prepare an early breakfast. As we usually do, we packed some plastic bags with travel snacks and stashed them away into our back packs: walnuts, almonds, apples, some cheese, some hard boiled eggs and a chocolate bar (70 % cocoa) for an indulgent dessert. It felt a bit unusual to sit down to a vegetable omelet, enjoy some berries and nuts and fix a cup of Americano at 5 in the morning, but we got over the early hour and enjoyed our breakfast. It was a good start to cope with a three-hour time switch that awaited us at the end of the trip.

After checking in at the airport we were greeted with the pleasant news, that our seat arrangement had been upgraded: we would travel first class, as they could not accommodate us in economy. To complete the sense of unexpected luxury, a full breakfast would be included. We did not expect any gourmet fare, but it was welcome news. After some time the flight attendants started to serve the meal. The choices were a cereal bowl or a scrambled egg skillet southwestern style for breakfast. My readers know already that I do not hold the breakfast cereal in high esteem. Cereal has the undesirable effect of sending blood sugar levels to unhealthy highs and as a result causing insulin spikes, so it is not a prudent choice in the first place. We asked for the scrambled eggs, cautiously enquiring: ‘What is in it?”

Airplane Food And Airport Food, A Personal Travel Experience

Airplane Food And Airport Food, A Personal Travel Experience

We were informed that it would be scrambled eggs with some black beans, green and red peppers, ham, onion and some cheese. It sounded really good, and we felt like a glutton having eaten a substantial breakfast at home and now getting some more! It turned out to be a bit different. The meal arrived. It was a flat skillet dish, which consisted of a thick layer of potato cubes held together by a yellow substance, which could not really be described as scrambled eggs. About half a dozen cubes of peppers were identifiable along with a few black beans. I started mining for onions and ham and tried to dig out the egg. It was virtually impossible! The amount of egg that I could retrieve was not more than 1 level tablespoon, and there were a few tiny specks of ham. My wife had the same experience. Needless to say, the skillets were almost full of potatoes, when we sent them back. The flight attendant came through one more time and offered a basket of croissants and buns to complete the breakfast, which we politely refused. As you see, we did not have any need to feel guilty about ingesting a second breakfast onboard, as this meal was simply unsuitable for anybody who was seeking balance in nutrition. To make it short: it is almost exclusively overfeeding the consumer with a load of dense carbohydrates (potatoes, croissants and buns), neglects a sensible amount of protein, and omits any healthy fat source. Out of sheer curiosity I flicked through the pages of an in-flight magazine that listed the foods that could be purchased on board for lunch. The results were not inspiring. There was an assortment of snack foods: potato chips, pretzels, super-size chocolate chip cookies, a candy bar that I had met before on TV and beef jerky. The meal selection featured three types of sandwiches: ham and cheese, brie and turkey breast, and a “loaded” super Italian affair with salami, which looked like a guarantee to a case of indigestion. The cheese plate was sold out and the fresh fruit plate was gone too. Sorry, no luck! As a matter of fact we were lucky and so were all the other passengers who came prepared with a stash of travel foods. When we got hungry towards noon we dug out our travel snacks, drank some water and were quite satisfied.

On our return trip, we traveled economy class (no upgrade to first class food or first class seats this time). It was another lengthy trip coast to coast, and as there were two lengthy layovers, the day was even longer. We arrived at one international airport at the East coast by lunchtime. This time we decided to get a meal at one of the numerous eating establishments. After all, just recently news articles had praised airport restaurants having embraced many healthy food choices. So this would not be airplane food but REAL food! We had some time to walk around and explore, and it turned out, that we certainly needed it! We salivated at the sight of a choice of mahi-mahi with a mixed salad at one café. Cautiously we wondered whether this would be grilled fish. No, we were told, this would be breaded and deep-fried! And it would not be offered in any other way. Too bad, this was not really what we wanted! An Asian food outlet offered a buffet-style assortment of food. It did look very good, and we loved the chicken and vegetable choice or the beef and broccoli with mushroom dish. It did look fresh and appetizing. Often Asian foods can contain MSG. We wanted to make sure that this substance would not be in the food at this place. Sorry, we were told, all the meats and vegetables did contain MSG! Monosodium glutamate is not a harmless flavor enhancer. It belongs into the group of excitotoxins. The substance can destroy brain cells. It also has the potential to give you a nasty headache, especially if larger quantities are used. We were looking for food minus a headache, so we walked away once again and looked for more. An Italian bistro offered the usual suspects: piles of pasta and pizza! And there was a bakery with towering-high tortes, cinnamon buns, and muffins. It was overfeeding of the already carbo-holic individual and under nourishing the traveller. Sad!

After this expedition through the terminal we did finally find a meal that would sustain us until the evening. It was a pre-packaged Thai salad. It was certainly nothing fancy, but it contained a large amount of lettuce and other salad vegetables, offered a small but appropriate amount of cooked shredded real chicken, not some processed salty fake meat, and a small container of salad dressing on the side. It was enough to feel pleasantly full without feeling stuffed and good enough to keep us going till the evening.

Yes, we really wanted a touch of luxury for dessert! We thought of the duty free shop and envisioned a square or two of sinfully dark chocolate. Actually, this is not sinful at all! Have a piece of chocolate with over 70 % cocoa content or even 85%. It is not bitter, but an explosion of flavor on your taste buds, and it happens to be a source of anti-oxidants and bioflavonoids. It lowers high blood pressure and gobbles up free radicals, and as a result it can protect you from heart disease. One word of caution: use moderate amounts! Two or three squares only, not more, please!

And there was chocolate at the duty-free shop, lots of it! There were praline selections in large varieties, and there were Lindt and Ghirardelli chocolate bars, two well-known brands! We rejoiced…but too early! There were six packs featuring extra-creamy, sea-salt, caramel, chocolate and chili. As we studied the labels it was very obvious, that this was not at all what we were looking for! One bar in six was of excellent quality with a high cocoa percentage. The rest was a “gourmet mix”, all of them with low cocoa percentage and high sugar content, which really means it was useless. Were we willing to waste our money on half a dozen chocolate bars of which just one single bar was the merchandise we wanted? The answer was no! And of course, the package could only be sold this way; sorry, no choice! After leaving the duty free store with all its high-class brands behind, we found a humble news and magazine outlet. It had nice, entertaining reads to shorten the next leg of our journey. And-what a surprise! There was a stack of chocolates by an unknown European manufacturer with an 85 % cocoa content. Lucky us! An interesting magazine and dessert too! Bon voyage!

Conclusion

We do not think that we are the only health conscious persons on the planet. We hope that someone in charge in any airport or in an airline catering company smells a business opportunity. We are not demanding. We just prefer healthy foods and it would be great to find a meal choice with whole foods such as greens, vegetables, wild salmon, organic chicken, or grass-fed antibiotic-free beef. There is no need for anything elaborate. It’s really back to the basics! Even a mixed salad with a healthy protein portion would fit in very well. It is time that not just a few high class chefs around the world take notice of the new changes of a healthy diet that I summarized in this blog recently: “Buying Into High Carb, Low Fat Myth Makes You Sick”. In case you want to read more, I am in the process of publishing a book, which also contains 7 days of healthy menus at the end of it. It will be published early in 2014 through Amazon.com and is entitled: “A Survivor’s Guide To Successful Aging” (addendum Nov.7, 2014: It has been published March 31, 2014).

Last edited Nov. 7, 2014