Many water filters are bad for you
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That's the claim, I don't know for certain if it's true. It's something to try out if you want.
Apparently the hardcore water filters most health conscious people get also remove the naturally occurring minerals from your water. The mineral-depleted water then leeches minerals from your own body when you drink it (at least when drunk on an empty stomach) making it pretty significantly bad for your health. You end up always mineral depleted, always dehydrated. People report constipation, tooth decay, gray hair, dry skin, brain fog, extra painful periods, and weight gain when drinking excessively filtered water.
Many testimonials on Kayleigh Mason's instagram stories of people feeling better after going back to unfiltered water.
https://www.instagram.com/nutrition.elements/Interview with her, which is partly about this topic:
Youtube VideoDistilled, Reverse Osmosis, and at least some of the Ion Exchange based filters (Pro One, Clearly Filtered, and possibly Berkey) are all capable of removing way too many minerals from your water.
It seems that the cheap activated carbon only water filters are better as they can remove some chemicals but shouldn't be able to remove much minerals.
Remember, the issue is that mineral depleted water LEECHES minerals from your own body.
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@Insr any dissolved mineral will negate the osmotic pressure issue, is what I learned from a pubmed study on the topic of 0ppm water causing potential cardiovascular issues. iirc the study specifically says it doesn't matter what mineral is dissolved to negate the osmotic pressure issue. so a pinch of table salt works.
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this is exactly why they say to not make distilled water your drinking water of choice
many such cases
@sunsunsun how much specifically was needed? a pinch of table salt could be a lot if your water is in a bottle, for example
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@engineer use a texas size pinch then
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I've been researching under sink water filters, connected to a dedicated drinking faucet, that goes next to the main kitchen faucet. It's hard to really conclude exactly what you're getting which each filtering option.
As for the minerals being taken out during filtering: if it's RO (reverse osmosis), most provide an end stage that puts the minerals back in; if it's not RO, the claim seems to be they never take the minerals out to begin with — the reason for a high TDS (total dissolved solids) reading. Arguably, as a result of attempting to keep the minerals, are other things remaining that are questionable?
So far, for a budgeted price, it's hard to find a system that addresses everything: chloramine (makes tap water taste bad, but it's not in all states, regions), microplastics, maintain minerals — just to name a few. For the lower end, budgeted systems, it's an either or situation, I'm finding. It's either a focus on microplastics or chloramine, but not the best filter for both.
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I have to wonder if the amount of contaminants in tap water really matters all that much, unless you're living near pesticide farm fields.
Kayleigh Mason states that remineralizing RO water is not as good as drinking it unfiltered, though I don't know exactly why that would be. But it does intuitively make sense to me that there's something good about natural water that is lost when you run it through a machine, and you can't get the goodness back by just putting some stuff in it.
It would be more fun to just drink water and not care.
