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lauradi7dwhttps://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/29/dining/raw-water-unfiltered.html?_r=0
That may be behind a pay wall. The gist - a number of people who want to be all-natural or something are paying exorbitant prices for spring water that hasn't been treated, filtered, or processed (except for whatever process is required to bottle it, presumably). In response, there have been concerned health articles and a lot of sarcasm on social media, about how natural diarrhea is. I am a big fan of tap water and like living somewhere that it is safe to drink what comes through the pipes, if you have a good immune system (twenty-five years ago there was enough cryptosporidium in MWRA water that a friend with AIDS was affected/infected). But I am a little confused by the uproar. Doesn't Poland Springs claim to have all natural water out of a spring? Is the difference that they have tested it to be sure it's OK? What nobody seems to mention is that millions of us grew up drinking "raw" water and were fine, except for the unfortunate condition of our tooth enamel. I have no idea what percentage of homes in the US use well water rather than some sort of municipal supplier, but I bet it is large. I asked my mother the other day about how they knew the water was safe. She said that the well was 55 feet down (implying a lot of filtration by the soil?) and that when it was dug (in 1954), they sent a sample to the health department to be tested for bacteria. Once. They switched over to "city water" about fifteen years ago when the neighboring development put in pipes, because with a well, if you lose power, you don't have water - the pump doesn't work. They felt that it was a more secure thing to be connected.
That may be behind a pay wall. The gist - a number of people who want to be all-natural or something are paying exorbitant prices for spring water that hasn't been treated, filtered, or processed (except for whatever process is required to bottle it, presumably). In response, there have been concerned health articles and a lot of sarcasm on social media, about how natural diarrhea is. I am a big fan of tap water and like living somewhere that it is safe to drink what comes through the pipes, if you have a good immune system (twenty-five years ago there was enough cryptosporidium in MWRA water that a friend with AIDS was affected/infected). But I am a little confused by the uproar. Doesn't Poland Springs claim to have all natural water out of a spring? Is the difference that they have tested it to be sure it's OK? What nobody seems to mention is that millions of us grew up drinking "raw" water and were fine, except for the unfortunate condition of our tooth enamel. I have no idea what percentage of homes in the US use well water rather than some sort of municipal supplier, but I bet it is large. I asked my mother the other day about how they knew the water was safe. She said that the well was 55 feet down (implying a lot of filtration by the soil?) and that when it was dug (in 1954), they sent a sample to the health department to be tested for bacteria. Once. They switched over to "city water" about fifteen years ago when the neighboring development put in pipes, because with a well, if you lose power, you don't have water - the pump doesn't work. They felt that it was a more secure thing to be connected.
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Date: 2018-01-07 03:49 am (UTC)Yes, and it undergoes a "ten-step quality process" which includes filtering and disinfecting it so it won't give you, say, amoebic dysentery.
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Date: 2018-01-07 02:47 pm (UTC)I remember ages ago being impressed that Canada required an ingredients list on bottled water. The one that we had bought turned out to have arsenic (but not giardia, apparently).
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Date: 2018-01-08 01:48 am (UTC)You're welcome.
I found this article a useful comment on the situation. The point isn't that it is recklessly foolhardy for anyone to drink non-municipal water under any circumstances. (My brother's family has a well. And it has filters for arsenic and particulates and is also aerated for radon, without which it would not be safely drinkable, even coming from an aquifer that is regularly certified by the town in which they live.) It's that this particular form of conspicuous consumption is being practiced at the expense of people who can't even afford the choice between safe and unsafe drinking water, using language that accelerates distrust in the municipal systems on which those people are reliant. I've started to think of it as anti-vaxxing for drinking water.
The one that we had bought turned out to have arsenic (but not giardia, apparently).
If it's a trace enough level of arsenic that the company could bottle it, I think they made the right call.
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Date: 2018-01-08 02:40 am (UTC)Radon confuses me. We have some in our basement, and have never done anything about remediation. My detector broke several years ago.
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Date: 2018-01-08 06:23 am (UTC)Honestly, I would not be surprised. From the article you linked: "Call me a conspiracy theorist, but it's a mind-control drug that has no benefit to our dental health." Seriously?
Radon confuses me. We have some in our basement, and have never done anything about remediation. My detector broke several years ago.
I don't know the risks of having it in your basement, though I would assume that a high level of exposure over a long period of time is probably not a great idea. In groundwater used as drinking water, it's a carcinogen, hence the aeration to get it out.
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Date: 2018-01-12 05:30 pm (UTC)"To be fair, as far as tap water goes, Live Water is pretty great. The Deschutes Valley Water District won 'Best Tasting Water' awards in a blind taste test with judges from across the state in 1996, 2001, 2003, and 2013, and Pugh said local residents tell him they often take tap water with them in bottles on vacation. But does that make it worth anywhere from $16–$60 per jug in San Francisco?"