You already know I’m a stickler about clean food. I do my best to prepare most of my food at home from scratch and so far I’ve posted over 60 of my recipes on this blog. I’m a stickler for clean water too. Even though your water may come from a town water supply, it may contain some questionable elements that are actually added by municipalities in the interest of your health. The two elements I’m talking about are Chlorine and Fluoride.
My new Berkey Filter
Chlorine is added to water supplies to disinfect the water in transport pipes, just like the chlorine you put into a swimming pool to kill unwanted germs. But it’s not as cut and dried simple as that! Chlorine introduced into the water supply reacts with other naturally-occurring elements to form toxins called trihalomethanes (THMs), which eventually make their way into our bodies. THMs have been linked to a wide range of human health maladies ranging from asthma and eczema to bladder cancer and heart disease. The good news is that chlorine dissipates rapidly when water is boiled or left standing and exposed to air, it can also be easily filtered. Just about every filter system takes out 99.9% of the chlorine in your water.
Fluoride is another matter. It is not as easily filtered as chlorine is, it also does not simply evaporate like chlorine does from water. Fluoride is added to municipal water system under the false assumption that it can help to decrease tooth decay. As a retired dentist, I’ve done extensive research about the problems with putting fluoride in municipal water supplies. Last January, I wrote Why Your Dentist Doesn’t Know the Scoop on Fluoride. If you need more convincing that fluoridated water is not good for your health, visit Fluoride Action Network and you can spend days reading all the research and info there.
Most basic water filters do not take the fluoride out. Up until now all I’ve been able to find are expensive reverse osmosis systems that often require a plumber to install. I just recently discovered the Berkey Filter which has an additional filter that takes out fluoride. I bought one. It was reasonably priced, easy to assemble and looks cool on my kitchen counter.
Being a non-stop idealist I’ve been trying for years to convince my town to take the fluoride out of our municipal water supply. It would save money and protect the health of the community. Instead of continuing to bank my head against the wall, I’ll just tell my friends and neighbors to get a Berkey Filter instead.
