Water. The body's drink of choice. Water is available today with many additives such as artificial coloring, sugar, salt, phosphoric acid, carbonation, coffee beans, alcohol, hops, barley, chemicals, herbs, milk solids, fruit and vegetable solids, and a vast number of other ingredients. And water is also available in the plain variety with nothing added (hopefully).

"Water, water everywhere, but not a drop to drink." This sentiment was uttered by someone adrift at sea; seawater being harmful to consume. Today we're fortunate to have drinking water piped right into our home. But is this water also harmful?

To prevent bacteria from hitching a ride on the municipal water supply lines, chlorine is added to kill these potential threats to our health. But unfortunately the water suppliers don't take out the chlorine at its point of use. Why? The EPA does not consider chlorine a water contaminant. This is ludicrous. But it's also politically expedient. All EPA maximum contaminant allowables are politically negotiated figures that do not necessarily have any basis in reality. They represent a compromise between the ideal, and what can practically be done by water treatment plants. So, if the water you drink comes from your tap, many people agree it's prudent the chlorine be removed.

The first line of defense for my home drinking water is a high quality solid (as opposed to granular) carbon block filter. Carbon is the best known treatment for organic chemicals, VOCs (Volatile Organic Compounds), pesticides, herbicides, and chlorine and its by-products. Chlorine removal is what carbon is best at, and nothing else equals carbon's ability to remove chlorine. And although carbon is not recommended for coliform removal, or for cysts, some of the very tight solid carbon block filters now on the market do a great job at removing bacteria and cysts like giardia and cryptosporidium. My favorite brand, Multi-Pure (www.multipure.com), uses an absolute 1/2 micron filter, which has holes about ten times smaller than cryptosporidium organisms (microns are a measurement of the pore size, so the smaller the number, the "tighter" the filter). Although other types of very tight filtration might work as well, the very dense carbon block filters now on the market are very effective against certain forms of microbiological contaminants. These tight filters will last six to 12 months depending on usage. A filter that promises to last three or five years can do so only because it lets everything smaller than a bowling ball pass through.

Replacing your carbon filter cartridge when its effectiveness has diminished is very important. Some people wait until they detect a chlorine smell before replacing their cartridge. Remember, carbon filters have a different capacity for different contaminants. Most carbon filters will begin to allow other chemicals to pass through long before they begin to allow chlorine to pass. So to insure you're not drinking any trihalomethanes (chemicals that are formed when water containing organic matter is treated with chlorine), replace your cartridge at least once a year. And if the flow has diminished, it's time for a replacement.

Carbon filters do not do a good job at removing nitrates and sodium. Reverse osmosis and distillation remove both, so either combined with a high quality carbon filter provides complete treatment. Some RO units incorporate carbon filters. Carbon filters, distillation and RO are all effective at removing fluoride.

If I were an ill person, I'd distill my water. I'd fill my distiller (which looks like a medium sized coffee pot) with water from my solid carbon block Multi-Pure filter (which is connected to my kitchen sink). Distill into a one gallon glass jar, shake up the finished product to remove the "flat" taste (supposedly you're infusing oxygen back into the water molecules or realigning something-or-other; regardless, it makes the water taste normal), and I leave the bottle in the sun for a while.

Because distillation removes EVERYTHING from the water, some people add back some minerals. This is to make the water more alkaline. I believe this is important for people who consume a diet that is more acid than alkaline (animal products are very acid forming). I eat a plant-based diet, which is very alkaline, so I don't add anything to the distilled water. With a solid carbon block filter and distillation, you'd be getting the purest water you can get. If you're not battling disease, drinking water from a high quality solid carbon filter is fine.

If you don't want filters and other pieces of equipment to purify your own water, you can buy water. Some stores have machines that make some great water. I caution you if you decide to purchase distilled water. Because distilled water is "empty" (contains no dissolved particles), it has a great capacity to pull contaminants from the bottle it sits in; much more so than spring water. It is rarely sold in glass bottles, which would be the container of choice. If you buy distilled water, try to get it in the clear, polycarbonate type plastic, and not the white plastic, and transfer it to glass as soon as you get it home. If you can find a place that dispenses distilled water into your own container, I'd bring a glass bottle. The cost of your own distiller will pay for itself after a time, and you can avoid lugging water home from the store. Drinking a goodly amount of water (and most people drink way too little), would necessitate a lot of lugging... that's why I purify my own. Two good distiller companies are Waterwise (www.waterwise.com) and Polar (ww4.prairieweb.com/polar-bear). If you're looking at Waterwise, go for the model 4000; it allows you to distill into a glass bottle with a little finagling (email me to find out how).

But if you don't want to spend the time needed to make distilled water, using a solid carbon block filter like the Multi-Pure goes a long way towards ensuring you're drinking healthy water.

So let's drink to our good health! And let's drink healthy water.

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