The Truth About Drinking Water Purification Systems

Early in the last century, public drinking water purification systems were introduced to protect the populations of our cities from sometimes fatal waterborne diseases. The problem is that in many cities around the country, the drinking water purification system has changed little since it was first implemented.



I'm sure that the public utilities do what they can, for the most part. Of course, there have been reports in respected publications that indicate otherwise, but that could just be human error. It is hard for me to believe that anyone would risk the health of his friends and neighbors by faking test results that allow the EPA to continue to approve a public drinking water purification system that is no longer effective.



Of course, it could be that the employees are unaware of or do not believe in the risks. If you worked at a treatment facility on a daily basis and you saw all of the treatment processes that were in place, you might just think that there could not possibly be anything wrong.



You would be familiar with the processes involved in water purification which include flocculation, UV disinfection, carbon filtration, water softening, reverse osmosis, ultrafiltration, deionization and chemical disinfection, among others.



You might know what the source-water looked and smelled like. You might see that sand, as well as, organic material, parasites, giardia, cryptosporidium, bacteria, algae, viruses, fungi, minerals and metals are at least partially removed by the drinking water purification systems used at you place of employment.



So, it could be that you believe in your company's drinking water purification system and that you think the testing is flawed. In truth, the tests are flawed, but not in the way that you might think.



The EPA realized that there were contaminants in groundwater and reservoirs. They felt that 100% removal was impossible. So, they established "safe" upper limits for public drinking water purification systems.



Of course, no drinking water purification system can remove all of the pollutants and industrial contaminants that are present in the environment. But, there are home filtration devices that come close at 99.99%.



But, aside from that, the safe upper limits for municipal drinking water purification systems were based on the idea that everyone in the country weighs at least 175 pounds. You see the toxicity of a contaminant has to do with the size and weight of the creature being used for testing. In most cases, the original tests were performed using laboratory mice and then the human toxicity was extrapolated from those results.



In this way they established "tolerable upper limits" for a drinking water purification system. They never considered how little a child weighs when it is born and how tap-water is used to make formula, particularly by families that are poor. They never considered the long-term health risks of consuming these contaminants on a regular basis throughout an individual's life. And, they never considered that the "average" weight does not apply to everyone in the country. So, they never considered our children.



Now that you know this you will see why every health conscious family should consider the installation of point-of-use or in-home drinking water purification systems that are certified to remove at least 99% of the toxins in our environment.