13 Years of Alkaline Water: Lessons I’ve Learned
Ian Blair Hamilton is the founder of AlkaWay and Ion Life, and has been a researcher, writer and advocate for alkaline health philosophy for over 13 years.
Lessons I Have Learned
When I began drinking alkaline ionized water I didn’t even know what an ‘ion’ was.
I failed miserably at chemistry at school. I was the class disruptor. The idea of a universe of elements confined to a single table of values was anathema to me. I wanted infinite possibility rather than the confines of a periodic table that explained the ‘Theory of Everything’.
Times have changed.
I am still no expert in chemistry but I’ve grown to love the process of learning about a subject that fascinates me; the relationship of pH balance to my – and others’ – health. It has taken me into physics, chemistry, biology and psychology as I learned why the world in general refuses to understand the huge advantage of an alkaline body. Strangely, I look back on myself at school and understand that unless a person is ready to learn – and change – they simply can’t hear even the words of their best friends when it interferes with their idea of normal life.
Enough of the philosophy; you are reading this to learn about alkaline water, so let’s get on with it.
If you are here you’ve probably already been exposed to some form of information, most likely from someone attempting to sell you a water ionizer. So let’s begin at the beginning with the word ‘ion’.
An ion is an atom. Got that? Good. But it’s an atom that carries an electrical charge, or is in need of an electrical charge, so if you like it’s an electrically unbalanced atom.
Of course nothing is imbalanced in nature. So an atom with a positive electrical charge has just one purpose in creation; it is looking for an ion that is missing a charge so it can donate its charge, and return to normal atom state. It’s a completely beneficial meeting for both atoms involved return to being just atoms instead of ions. They return to balance.
It took me some time to get the significance of this and I wish my chemistry teacher had told me about ions and what I’m about to share.
(Actually, he probably did tell me, but I was too busy teasing the girls to notice.)
We read about chemical reactions everywhere; in the air, in the earth, in industry and medicine, and within our body. A chemical reaction is the action of ions co-operating to create a new molecular substance. They give and they take and they become a substance rather than simple separate atoms. So ions are the key to all chemical reactions plus the formulation of new substances. This extends from simple salt – a joining of ionic sodium and ionic chlorine – all the way up the high level multi-atom substances.
But we don’t need to worry about getting into the understanding of complex substances because ionized water is a very simple ionic transfer. Basically, it’s the creation of a new form of water that has more infused hydrogen gas in it than usual. More “pH”. Percentage of hydrogen.
You probably think that there’s just one way to do this.
There are a number of ways including magnetics, electrolysis and passing water over certain reactive elements. The latter is the cause of the amazing so-called ‘healing’ springs around the world, evidenced simply by a lighter molecular weight of these special waters.
I have experienced excellent health (in the main) over my 14 years of alkaline life. I don’t attribute all of it to alkaline ionized water but it’s my firm belief that so many years without my usual annual colds and flu has something to say about the water’s immune support abilities.
You’ll find hundreds of testimonials for the water online and although in my opinion most of them are real, I need to caution you that nothing fixes everything and every case needs to be seen in the context of their previous lifestyle choices.
To give a simple example – when did you ever see a diet that didn’t claim miraculous benefits from ‘Mrs J. Smith of Alabama”. The reality for all diets is that if a person is already slowly killing themselves with the SAD (Standard American Diet) anything a little healthier will provoke a healing response. Was it the specific diet? Yes.. and no. the specific diet provoked the response but any diet of equal quality would probably have done the same.
So please… be a little careful in your research. I think I can assist you hugely today because I’m going to share a meta analysis of over 100 international studies of the health effects of natural alkaline water. And then I’ll attempt to show you the differences between electrically created - and natural alkaline water. There are very important differences as well as very important similarities.
The Study and What I Learned.
The study is the best piece of information on alkaline water I have read for 13 years.
It is completely cross referenced to actual studies, which makes it head and shoulders above any other form of document you would usually read on the net. What it says is as correct as science has managed to make it. (The foundation of scientific inquiry relies upon your study’s result being accepted as correct only until someone proves otherwise.)
So what does it say?
It concentrates on the two major elements of alkaline water in nature; Calcium and Magnesium.
“Both of these elements are essential for the human body. Calcium is a part of bones and teeth. In addition, it plays a role in neuromuscular excitability (decreases it), good function of the conducting myocardial system, heart and muscle contractility, intracellular information transmission and blood coagulability.”
It goes on to say that osteoporosis (my problem) and osteomalacia are the most common symptoms of Ca and Mg deficiency.
Please note: it does NOT say directly that more calcium will cure these conditions. We’ve independently researched this and there’s a much bigger story here. But let’s move on. (If you’d like to know more go here)
Download the Meta Study here
The report then talks about the superstar of alkaline minerals, Magnesium:
“Magnesium plays an important role as a cofactor and activator of more than 300 enzymatic reactions including glycolysis, ATP metabolism, transport of elements such as Na, K and Ca through membranes, synthesis of proteins and nucleic acids, neuromuscular excitability and muscle contraction etc.
… Magnesium deficiency increases risk to humans of developing various pathological conditions such as vasoconstrictions, hypertension, cardiac arrhythmia, atherosclerotic vascular disease, acute myocardial infarction, eclampsia in pregnant women, possibly diabetes mellitus of type II and Osteoporosis.”
Is there a pill anywhere on earth that gives so much benefit?
It’s so commonly available, so well researched to PROVE these claims, yet most of us (according to the report) are severely lacking magnesium in our diet!
Although there were some scattered studies as early as 1927 recommending hard water over soft, it wasn’t until 1950 when Japanese scientists concluded that hard (alkaline) water was more beneficial than soft water in prevention of cardio vascular disease. To be very clear, they found higher mortality rates from cerebrovascular diseases (stroke) in the areas of Japan with more acid (i.e. softer) water compared to those with more alkaline (i.e. harder) water used for drinking purposes.
Many studies followed across the world with similar conclusions. In the two decades of investigation of water hardness and its association with heart disease, over 100 studies were completed! My question that must be asked is that if it is so obviously scientifically proven, why have our health authorities not advanced a diet giving the required amounts of both?
Some people may correctly ask how sure researchers are that it is calcium and magnesium that has such an effect. Could it not be any of the other essential minerals we all need? Yet in study after study, no significant association with other minerals was found.
(One significant finding was the effect of acidic water on home reticulation systems and its tendency to corrode sufficiently to cause leaching of toxic heavy metals)
By 1992 it was generally agreed that Magnesium was the great healer and that calcium had only a supportive effect against heart disease.
But as you’ll soon see, magnesium in water is quite different to magnesium in food.
By 1990 studies had advanced to a stage where even more hard data and beneficial correlations between Ca, Mg and CVD was available. Before this time there were a number of studies questioning the methodology of some earlier studies. These are to me, a healthy debate phase and although some earlier studies were not as rigid as they could have been, the basic fact of the correlation survived the rigour of scientific debate.
The later studies extended the benefits of magnesium beyond CVD to AMI (Advanced Myocardial Infarction)
“…the persons enrolled in the group with the highest water Mg level had a risk level of death from AMI by a third lower (odds ratio 0.64) as compared to the groups consuming water containing less Mg than 8.3 mg/l.”
I like to try to see what a statistic looks like in real life. A reduction by one third of death from myocardial infarction looks like the pic above.
It’s also interesting to see how some of the studies learned about hard water’s health benefits. In one Swedish study, the hard water benefit was only discovered when health authorities investigated why one particular geographic region consumed less heart drugs. It was the water!
Another peculiarity of one study was the discovery of a correlation between ambient temperature and heart disease. While this seems to have nothing to do with magnesium or water, it reminded me that Chinese Shaolin monks alkalize with cold dips in mountain streams.
As the studies rolled on, it became clearer and clearer that it was magnesium that was doing the work in preventing Advanced Myocardial Infarction, not the calcium.
Next, a study popped up showing less danger for sudden infant death syndrome,
“It is hypothesized that magnesium deficiency is implicated in cardiovascular spasms and cardiac arrhythmias leading to death.”
More good news followed. Unlike most trace minerals, which take many months or years to have a beneficial effect, studies emerged showing that the effects of drinking hard water surfaced in a matter of weeks rather than years. This probably explains the sometimes ‘miraculous’ reports we get from users.
(I remember one man who was dragged into our offices by his wife and was very against the whole idea. He said nothing but drank a glass to keep his wife happy. They were back the next day. “For the first time in years I had no reflux!” he explained.)
Here’s where it gets really interesting.
If switching over to alkaline water is good for you, what happens if you have been drinking alkaline water all your life and you change to soft water?
This is an example of what happened in a number of recorded cases:
“…among Czech and Slovak population who started to use reverse osmosis based systems for final treatment of drinking water at their home outlets in 2000-2002 and several weeks later reported different health complaints suggestive of acute magnesium deficiency.”
More benefits studies rolled in. A French study found that calcium in the water contributed to a lack of neurological disturbance in the elderly.
In Spain a report found schoolkids drinking alkaline water suffered less fractures. Another report found that hard water drinkers had consistently lower blood pressure. A second report discovered the same in pregnant women, which is no surprise to me given that the embryonic child is dragging all his/her mother’s alkaline minerals out to create a new skeleton. And it wasn’t only mothers who benefited. A Taiwan study of 1751 women found that hard water gave better protection against low pre- and post birth baby weight. Furthermore,
“Higher intake of calcium is believed to decrease smooth muscle contractility and tonus, which clinically results in lower blood pressure and lower rate of pre-term births.”
Next came a study showing low Magnesium levels in drinking water to be a factor in motor neurone disease, closely followed by another with similar indications for preeclampsia.
Not all studies agreed with each other. A Taiwanese study correlated low Mg and diabetes but a US one found no such correlation. Personally, given the fact that diabetes is often the result of bad diet and excess fat accumulation, which renders the body almost permanently in a state of inflammation, I would theorize that magnesium’s anti-inflammatory abilities were probably what the Taiwanese observed.
More studies, more results.
Low Ca and Mg levels were linked with Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis A.K.A. Lou Gehrig’s disease.
Even dental caries and periodontal disease are reduced with a sufficiency of Ca and Mg in drinking water… even when fluoride levels are low! So.. if we all had the right amounts of Ca and Mg perhaps we wouldn’t have fluoride forced upon us in our drinking water; a chemical already proven to reduce children’s intelligence.
From Russia came studies linking low Mg and Ca in drinking water with a whole range of ailments including:
“significantly higher incidence rates of hypertension, IHD, adrenergic function disturbances, gastric and duodenal ulcer and other diseases in the areas with soft water.”
Water Hardness and Cancer
Please note: This is not a substitute for proper medical advice. Please consult a qualified physician before embarking on any health regimen change.
Here’s a simplified list of a host of studies coming out of Taiwan.
All of them relate to the consumption of hard water and the beneficial effect.