Wednesday, January 14, 2015

Trader Joe's Alkaline Water + Electrolytes



I saw somebody on Twitter being all ecstatic to find that Trader Joe's now carries alkaline water. I asked him why he would want alkaline water. He did not reply.

But I know the answer: It's because he has fallen for a stupid scam, which claims that something terrible in your diet and/or environment is causing your body to be abnormally acidic, because of all the negative ions that are bombarding you, and that therefore you need to drink alkaline water to restore the correct pH. I don't know whether the good folks at Trader Joe's have fallen for this hogwash, but at least they have decided to capitalize on it. A pox on them for that.

For context: I completed medical school and residency, and then spent a good number of years practicing family medicine. Among many, many observations about the medical system that I collected was that quite consistently the smartest doctors were the nephrologists--the kidney specialists. It's a kind of esoteric specialty, and a difficult one to master, because the kidney is a frighteningly complex organ, capable of mysterious, nearly magical feats of biochemistry. In the context of that observation, consider this aphorism, which is common among those of that specialty: "The dumbest kidney is smarter than the smartest nephrologist."

Many crucial functions of your body simply will not work if your pH rises or falls below 7.4. Deviate, say, 0.2 units from that, and it's off to the ICU for you, and we're not too bullish on your prognosis. Deviate by 0.4 units, and, though you may not actually be dead, we'll start filling out the certificate in advance to save some time. With a few very rare exceptions (e.g., dialysis patients), if you're walking around and functioning, your pH is 7.4. Not 7.3 or 7.5. Seven. Point. Four.

How do I know that? Because your kidneys see to it. You'd die if they didn't. As your blood passes through your kidneys for waste removal, the kidneys at the same time selectively either hang onto or excrete various positive and negative ions to maintain your pH exactly where it needs to be. Sure, you might ingest some acidic foods, but the kidneys sense this and correct for it long before the deviation from ideal pH has any chance to cause any symptoms that you could notice.

Two basic points: (1) You have no ability to detect consciously what your pH is. (2) If the body relied on us to consciously monitor and adjust our pH, we'd all be dead.

All of which means this: When you drink water with a pH of 9.5, as this TJ's bottle claims to be, you are not correcting for an acidic pH. In fact, you are throwing a bunch of excessive positive ions into your system. There's no particular harm in this, since your kidneys can dump the excess into your urine just as fast as you can ingest it, so even a continuous pH monitor would never detect more than the minutest rise. (It's not just the kidneys. Your lungs get in on it even more quickly. You'll start breathing more shallowly--involuntarily, and without even noticing it--in order to retain more carbon dioxide in the blood, which acidifies it.) But alkaline water is not therapeutic in any sense of the word.

Still, I spent 99 cents on one bottle, just so that I could say I had tried it. I drank it last night, during a poker game at a friend's house. It tasted remarkably like...water. I could detect nothing aberrant about its taste. I also did not feel any magical sense that I had restored my woebegone physiology. I did not feel better, did not think better, did not gain any superpowers. In fact, I felt nothing at all. Oh, wait--that's not true. I felt LESS THIRSTY. Period.

Don't waste your money on crap like this. Drink tap water. If the tap water where you live tastes too awful to stand, get delivery of those 5-gallon bottles for a cooler, or buy the cheapest bottled water you can find.

Will I buy it again? 

No. I know better, and now so do you.

61 comments:

  1. You are so wrong!

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    1. they don't even teach doctors about food groups and things like that so he is talking out the side of his neck...all the trash in the other water who want it he must work for smart water lol they have the worse water around

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  2. Does this come in a gluten-free version?

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  3. What if tap water has chemicals such as Fluoride and Chlorine which are harmful to your body?

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  4. You are so right! I was ROFL when I read about this in Trader Joe's flyer. Minerals harvested from "the lake district of Utah". Yeah right! Meaning the Great Salt Lake I'm sure. I've seen that ugly salt plant. Then "purified" through reverse osmosis. Which, of course, takes most of the minerals back out. Which is desirable since they probably added salt sludge to begin with. Then electrolysis "which changes the structure of the water" -- producing hydrogen and oxygen?? and raising the pH to 9.5+? If the pH were actually 9.5, the drink would be unpalatable. There's a reason all popular drinks are acidic. Coffee, tea, soft drinks, fruit juice. And since your stomach contains hydrochloric acid, the "alkaline water" would be neutralized before it ever reached your blood stream, much less your kidneys.

    I, too, am a believer in tap water. Standards are pretty strict. I did an internship in a city water plant and the issue was finding good ways to easily measure the residual chemical content because it was so low. A few molecules of chlorine or bromine or fluoride hydrocarbons.

    The whole bottled water marketing thing amazed me when it started. The soda companies are making a killing. Selling the water they purify for making soft drinks for more than they charge after adding the soft drink flavoring.

    If you're concerned about global warming. Stop using hyper-processed products. All that energy used to produce "alkaline water" is adding to global warming.

    And by the way, when did corn become "high in acid" according to Trader Joe's?

    BPalme





    If you insist on drinking bottled water, other brands purify the water and then add a trace of purified minerals to make it taste better since pure water without minerals is rather bland.

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  5. I value the blog.Thanks Again. Awesome.

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  6. 99¢ is pretty cheap fire that much water. Tap is good, I like it. But maybe this can act as an antacids for those with acid reflux or something. And the taste want bad at all. I've had much much worse. In fact I have some bottled water sitting in the fridge cause it tastes bad.
    I like this inexpensive water from tj.

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    1. this is what I intend to use it for in order to get off ppi's (hopefully)

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    2. I believe in tap water also when that water was tested it had more ph in it then a lot of the bottled water I'll take tap over smart water any day

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  7. There are at least some studies to show the benefits of high alkaline water. The kidney and the human animal is incredible and complex. Doctors need to maintain an open mind to benefit us all.
    http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22844861/

    99¢ and tastes good. It's a streak.

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    1. So agree with you.

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    2. Read the link (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22844861/) and find this conversation interesting overall. Yes, the human body is an amazing organism. Props to god or whoever conceived of us. I greu up in New York State drinking purified well and spring water, and it was pure bliss, however since moving to Southern California, I won't drink tap water anymore. It tastes nasty and is exposed to too many contaminants until it gets into my kitchen. The Total Dissolved Solids of tap water in my SoCal area is over 450ppm, that's 50ppm below the federal "unsafe" level. Bottled water, or in-home processessing/purification is the only way to go, IMO.
      But I also approach the water argument from the other side, as an aquarist. Due to the additives and inherent toxins in a municipal water district's water, we cannot use tap water for our fish tanks. Tap water contains substances like chlorine, ammonia and chloramine, among may others, that while present only in trace amounts, are detrimental to nitrifying bacteria colonies, the buggers that process the harmful ammonia from fish waste and convert it into harmless nitrites and then nitrates. Nitrates are then either physically removed or plants are used to consume the nitrates. Regardless of all that, I won't drink tank water either, even though my tanks measure neutral pH around 7.2-7.6 and have a TDS of about 150-200.
      Aside from unwanted chemical components in tap water, microscopic pathogens are likely in water most major metropolitan water systems, especially during warmer weather, and UV sterilization is the only effective way to kill these fearsome foes, though not cost effective at the municipal level. So for the aquarist, RODI (Reverse Osmosis DeIonized) water is the only way to go for our tanks. Some make their own, others buy it at the fish store - or from a vending machine outside the local drugstore. RO water is pure, tasteless, is usually below neutral pH and contains less than 006ppm less Total Dissolved Solids. But is this best for the human body? Probably less burdonsome on the body, and organs, than tap water is.
      I have tasted the TJ's water in question. It is quite pleasant tasking, and better tasting that the local Arrowhead varieties offered in Southern California. If electrolyte and alkaline water are a ruse, then they are as much a sham as all the other fad-based products that are marketed at us. Who knew so many people had gluten allergies? Why are carcenogenic sugar substitutes still so popular - I guess we'd rather be sick and thin.
      Buying bottled water is more about convenience than health, IMO. I can manage my own water supply, but the burden of sanitizing my reusable vessel is a burden that most people toaday are willing to pay to avoid - not to mention the convenience of just buying a bottle of water when and where you need it. No arguement that portable potables are convenient, and cost effective, especially in a day when people will shell out $5 for a coffee drink made by a college graduate earning minimum wage - so why is a $1 for a bottle of water unreasonable? I think $5 for the same bottle of water in an airport, post-security, is more offensive.

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    3. Very well said. Thank you . I have been drinking alkaline water for 5 years and I have more energy, sleep very well and my blood test show massive improvement. My doc sees the differences. It flushes out toxins. Tap water breaks my face out horribly and I always get sick fr drinking it. Not to mention tap water taste horrible.

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  8. Profit, profit, profit. TJ's, MD's, and pharmaceutical companies. Who is the average Joe to trust? Holistic? It can make a person crazy. Just research from many aspects and choose which strikes your fancy.

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  9. I am a prolific kidney stone producer and have skin problems. As soon as I switched to alkaline water, my skin condition improved significantly, I haven't had any stones for a year almost and I feel the difference in many ways on my general well being. SO YOU ARE WRONG.
    TJ did not invent alkaline water, neither did WF. Most physicians are so against anything that PREVENTS because that PREVENTS them from seeing more patients. Bogus!

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    1. Your correct I started drinking Kangen Water back in 2011 the water at Traders Joe's is the same and has exact taste. as the Kangen Water 9.5 PH Balance ... This is only for smart people who have desired to take charge of your health...

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    2. AMEN! And well said! THANK YOU! You have just spoken some major truth here. "Uh-oh! People drinking ph balanced, micro clustered, TRULY hydrating water? Less disease! Less stress on organs! LESS OFFICE VISITS AND PRESCRIPTIONS! Less summer home... less Mercedes... shorter vacations... cheaper clothes... OH NO! We can't have that!"

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    3. Thank you and ABSOLUTELY!

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  10. This blog post is awfully generalized and poorly conceived. I'm not sure if this "doctor" is simply beholden to the pharmaceutical companies (equal probability that it is consciously or unconsciously so) that want to keep pushing pills into the mouths of every person on the planet, or if he really is the low-caliber doctor that he appears to be in this article. In either case, the extreme generalizations and borderline ignorant confirmation bias must be addressed.

    First, there are such conditions as GERD. Gastro Esophageal Reflux Disease. 'Acid reflux' as you've all commonly heard. This condition is basically the result of your body producing too much acid. It can quickly get exaserbated by certain foods, especially acidic foods and drinks. When excessive acid is produced in the stomach it wants to try to come up the esophagus and it can become extremely painful. If left untreated it can cause esophagal cancer and other problems. A common remedy that doctors like to push on people is to simply take a slow-release PPI medication each day. PPIs are Proton Pump Inhibitors - they prevent your body from producing acid, thus reducing the symptoms of GERD.

    This was the case with my GERD diagnosis last year. Long story short, the PPIs do work, some better than others. The issue is that they have their own (common) side effects for some people - as well as some long term concerns when used for extended periods of time, but we wont get into all of that here. What we will get into, is that some of the medications (the less expensive generic brands, in my experience) do not completely get rid of the symptoms, and I still quite often had extreme burning in my upper stomach.

    One glorious day, I just happened to be drinking a bottle of Alkaline water from TJs. It was absolutely dumb luck for me as my doctor gave no mention of what was about to transpire. The alkaline water completely (and almost immediately) neutralized the excess acid in my stomach that day. I thought, just like anyone, that it must have been a coincidence. So I continued testing this postulate for several days and months. I monitored what I ate, when I started to have an acid/GERD attack, I'd immediately go for my TJs alkaline water. And every time, the attack was eliminated.

    Since then, i've completely stopped taking my PPI, while keeping alkaline water (not always TJs's) near by at almost ALL times. My attacks were often and extremely painful. I haven't had one since.

    Alkaline water DOES have a purpose.

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    1. I know SO MANY PEOPLE that this water has helped in EXACTLY this way, with a lifetime of horrible acid problems completely disappearing by using this water! Your reply was intelligent and very well said. I, too, immediately thought that the writer of it was probably in the pharmaceutical game. Doctor? Hmmmmm.

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    2. Doctors are paid to keep us sick. They don't want us to know about any natural remedies and are so quick to tell us they won't work. I have GERD pretty bad, I've missed a lot of work over it (this is while I was taking various PPIs that were being shoved at me by every "doctor" I went and saw) and I still felt like garbage all the time. A healthy diet is the only thing that works, and for tips on that, prepare to do all of the research on your own because a "doctor" certainly isn't going to have any advise for you beyond upselling more procedures and pushing more drugs. I have been so much better off since I quit the pills and changed my diet, but if I ever do have an upset stomach, I usually eat a banana and pound this Alkaline water from Trader Joe's and it does the trick!

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    3. I happened to have a bottle of TJ's Alkaline water, and lo and behold I stopped having a gigantic burping problem. I am monitoring myself now to see if this is the answer to the horrible problem I have been having for several years. I took Nexium, and continued to burp. I hope this alkaline water does the trick. I am very excited to share this experience with anyone who has a burping problem even after drinking regular water.

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    4. Actually, GERD is from not making enough hydrochloric acid. That's why people take apple cider vinegar and consume fermented foods, especially right before eating protein. It helps with digestion. When you deplete the hydrochloric acid through diet and possibly this water, you make your ph too alkaline and it causes GERD. Since switching my diet to include more probiotics, my digestion has improved considerably and I no longer have to take medication for indigestion and heartburn.

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  11. Typical corrupt drug pusher from the "farmakia" (i.e. witchcraft) cult called "doctors". Really? What has your sold-out, great whore medical system done to make America strong and healthy? A: Absolutely nothing. On the contrary, your system makes people weak, debilitated and dependent on your ineffective voodoo. You don't cure people; you just keep them dependent on the farmakia. What's next? You are going to tell us that flouride is the water is good for us.

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  12. Wow you are so wrong about this water!

    I have Interstitial cystitis (IC) and was diagnosed in 2009 after struggling with bladder pain since 2005. I work full-time and always have. I also have 3 kids, a very busy life! IC disease has no cure, a few forms of pain management treatments that mostly don't work and cause more problems. I know this first hand because a nurse damaged my bladder with a cath and I have been dealing with the pain since May. Recently I have found a few all natural treatments that have helped incredibly. I went from taking my heating pad to work everyday and back home to the bed to being able to be up and moving around again. Long story short the most amazing results I have seen are from drinking alkaline water and specifically Trader Joe's brand. I went from not being able to eat or drink anything acidic to being able to introduce some of those foods back into my diet. So my good doctor person on the other end... please do explain to me how and why alkaline has caused such a drastic improvement in my bladder health?

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  13. It hasn't. It's not capable of doing that. Our brains are hard-wired to see cause-and-effect relationships even where none really exist. So if you start drinking alkaline water and some medical condition improves, it's natural to jump to the conclusion that the first caused the second. But such apparent links are far more often illusory than real. The fact that most diseases fluctuate in intensity is what snake-oil salesmen rely on. Some meaningful percentage of people with just about any disease (except those few with an unrelentingly progressive course) will get better after taking some inert elixir, and those people tend to become convinced that the elixir was what did it.

    So one of two things has happened. (1) Your IC had a spontaneous remission, or something else caused the improvement, and you're erroneously attributing it to the water. Or (2) You stumbled across a placebo that works for you through a psychological effect. Placebo effects are real, powerful, useful, and not to be scoffed at. But the effect they exert has nothing to do with the specific content or form that any particular placebo takes.

    It would be interesting to do a quasi-scientific study on you. First we'd be sure that you can't tell the difference between alkaline water and regular water by taste or smell. Then we'd supply you with randomly chosen water--either regular or alkaline--for, say, a month, and select randomly again at the beginning of every month. You'd keep a diary of your symptoms. At the end of a year, we'd break the code to find out what you had been drinking every month and compare that to your symptom diary. I'd bet a large sum of money that there would be no discernible difference between the months you had regular water and the months you had alkaline water. Of course, it's prohibitively difficult logistically to actually carry out such an experiment, but that's the kind of thing you'd have to do in order to make a plausible case that there was a real causal connection that was not due to a psychological effect.

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    1. Dr. your mind-set will continue to kick out everyone's personal experience to justify your huge medical field's investment. Your profession is very adapt at managing disease, often creating more problems than the initial diagnosis by the significant side-effects of drugs, but rarely healing them. People have given wide-spread testimony that after switching to an alkaline diet have reversed all their diseases in a short period of time, albeit, it was the entire diet, not the water. I encourage your further study into alternative medicine and recommend reading pH Your Potential For Health by M.T. Morter, Jr., B, MA, DC.

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    2. What you say make sense but the masses are held back by their belief systems built on superstition. The mind is very powerful and can convince even the most conservative person to believe that gluten free food, alkaline water, vegan and raw diets, green tea, garcinia, etc. is the cure to their ailments. I fell for some of these fad trends and believed along with the rest that eating or drinking certain types of food will cure whatever ails me. I would say we need to look at the emotional component behind the ailments, something a lot of mainstream doctors need to start examining.

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  14. I got an email with another comment. I meant to approve it for publication, but accidentally misclicked the "delete" instead of the "publish" command. There seems to be no way to reverse that, but here's the comment as it came to me in the email:


    DancinDave .rocks has left a new comment on your post "Trader Joe's Alkaline Water + Electrolytes":

    Ha, ha! Look who's talking about "snake oil salesmen". The Farmakia Pusherman. Be glad we won't have to do a quasi-scientific study on you doc, because we already know what you are full of.

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  15. I'm just trying to figure out if there is fluoride in this water. Does anyone know? I do have to add in that I have a heart condition, tried medicine, couldn't function like I needed to. Started juicing and all of my symptoms disappeared. My cardiologist laughed and said it was probably only because I was hydrated now. Which was frustrating because I was drinking several gallons of water a day for months before the juicing. But anyway. I feel like only you know your body, and just because someone is a doctor, it doesn't mean they are always correct. I love doctors, they are extremely bright, but in my experience they are best at treating disease and not prevention or actual "health"....thanks for the article! -Sarah

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  16. Ha, ha! Look who's talking about "snake oil salesmen". The Farmakia Pusherman. Be glad we won't have to do a quasi-scientific study on you doc, because we already know what you are full of.

    What shocks me is that there are still people out there who "wonder" if doctors are "beholden" to big pharma. Isn't it obvious? Why would doctors tell you to take supplements or drink alkaline water that will cure you in 3 months when they can keep you on expensive drugs that they make kickbacks on and which are designed to keep you on drugs for 30 years? Why would they prescribe a course of treatment that costs exactly one office visit when they can make $300K+ on you over your short, pathetic, so-called life span?!

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  17. Not withstanding the fact that the business of medicine is a lucrative one, every "body" is different; genealogically, environmentally, circumstantially - to summarize in an extreme, what cures one person can kill another. And by the same token, one persons trash is another persons treasure; which seems to apply to opinions too.

    I have no doubt that the placebo affect is more powerful than the inert matter that it accompanies, but I also have no doubt that a change in body chemistry, triggered by the brain, is also sometimes the best medicine. Short of flying, we can accomplish more when the brain believes something is possible than when there is doubt or fear.

    The phrase "practicing medicine" implies that doctors and scientists are still struggling to understand the depth and abilities of the human body, and how we can positively affect it through medicine, treatment and insult. We are only still scratching the surface, there is so much more to learn, and in the meantime life goes on. Perhaps the answers are simpler than degrees can demonstrate; perhaps we all need to work harder, eat more vegetables, pollute our bodies and the planet less less and exercise more. Perhaps we've created a society that is ultimately not beneficial to our long term success as individuals and we're summoning our own ends via our means.

    Honestly, I think people are inherently lazy and that's why both the medical industrial complex and snake oil salesmen can coexist - we want results, and we want them now - and the cheaper the better, but sometimes we're willing to pay a lot.

    If $1 bottled water can cure cancer, or allow a person to "get better" or live a happier and longer life, I'm all in. Hope is a powerful motivator. Pharmacology and clinical studies are also powerful tools and have brought some tremendous medicines into the world as we endeavor to crack the code of what makes us tick, and keep us healthy and alive.

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  18. Recently diagnosed with stage II cancer. Begin radiation and chemo this week for 30 sessions. It was suggested to me that I should consider drinking ph balanced water.Thoughts?

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    1. I have Thyroid cancer and started on a vegetarian diet, no sugar, and alkaline water and feel great! i have done research on traditional (allopathic) medicine and treatments and it is said to be deadly. please educate yourself and make healthy changes in your diet. One Deeply informative book a friend gave me called KILLING CANCER NOT PEOPLE, i believe, is a life-saver, and i will NOT do conventional treatments after reading this educational book. God bless.

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  19. It won't make any difference, and the LAST thing you need at this point is being saddled with either the work of picking out the "right" water to drink, or guilt that you've picked the wrong one. Drink whatever water is handy, cheap, and tastes good. I hope all goes well for you.

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  20. I guess then that people who take antacids are just as deluded.

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  21. What I can say, in all honesty, is that working in the health care industry in NYC and with some of the most well respected people in the world when dealing with cancers, skin disorders, internal medicine and other issues, I have SEEN time and time again, people literally get better by using natural remedies, herbs, vitamins, certain diets and a positive outlook. I have also seen and personally experienced great things with proper alkaline ph balanced water. (We ALL know that the Japanese are always EONS ahead of us in EVERYTHING, so just look at their use and thinking on alkaline water if you are doubting it's ability to heal!) I have also heard a few people at different times try to persuade people this this water is useless, and EACH TIME they turned out to be people who were financially gaining by people NOT getting well, but by them having their sickness drawn out so that they had to remain on medicines for years. Money is a very powerful thing, and I believe that, unfortunately, a lot of the time, it is a LOT more important to a lot of physicians than their patient's health.

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  22. To the author of this article, I recently had my urine pH tested and it was 5.0. That's Five. Point. Zero. I must disagree with your comment "With a few very rare exceptions (e.g., dialysis patients), if you're walking around and functioning, your pH is 7.4. Not 7.3 or 7.5. Seven. Point. Four." as I am walking around and functioning. I recently started drinking TJs alkaline water to raise my 5.0 urine pH to a more normal state of homeostasis. As a member of the "walking around and functioning" crowd with a pH much lower than 7.4, I'm inclined to believe, perhaps you need to have a chat with the dumbest kidney, or examine CMEs research conducted by epidemiologists with no vested interest or bias, on the benefits of drinking alkaline water, because in my humble opinion, at 5.0 walking around and functioning, the author or this article harbors bias on the topic and perhaps vested interest in municipal water suppliers.

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  23. Auntie: The pH of your blood (which is what I was talking about, at 7.4) and the pH of your urine are not the same. I absolutely, 100% guarantee that you are not walking around with a blood pH of 5.0, or even 6.0 or 7.0. It is physiologically impossible. Your urine pH depends on your intake of acids and bases; it's one of the chief ways that your body keeps your blood pH constant, by dumping excess acid or base into the urine for excretion.

    Of course, if you drink a lot of alkaline water, your kidneys will dutifully excrete that excess into your urine, and its pH will rise as a result. But I'm unable to tell from your comment why you want to do this, or what good you think it will accomplish. Can you explain that?

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  24. With acidic urine pH, a low pH of urine means the kidneys are cleaning an excessive amount of acid from my internal environment in an effort to maintain homeostasis, hence the rationale behind the intake of alkaline water; to support and maintain a neutral internal environment.

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  25. You should read up on how numerous holistic Dr.'s are curing disease and illnesses. You should read up on how diseases thrive in anaerobic environments. Eating or drinking things to alkaline your body is good, because somethings we eat make our body acidic. If you haven't done thorough research on this you shouldn't be writing blogs about your thoughts. The Medical and pharmeceutical industries thrive on us being sick, so of course they didn't teach you this in medical school lol. Do some outside research and you'll see how wrong you are.

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  26. I was working in a tunnel running a 99 lb hand drill and blew out my shoulder. Did not want to lose my job so I took Alleve at night so I could snore at night. I forgot to eat and burned a hole in my stomach. After a 2 years it was so hurtful I could only eat only oatmeal and water(gross. My Dad told me of Kangen water which I thought that is the dumbest thing I ever heard. Within one month no more suffering. I was afraid, now enlightened.

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  27. I was introduced to the water by a coworker on yesterday. I saw her drinking and asked the purpose and benefits. The timing could not have been better, for the past week and a half I'd been battling with GERD so bad every time I tried to eat it was like there was a knot in my throat and it was hard to swallow. I bought the over the counter meds but it's a endless process of pill after pill and I don't like it. After leaving work I went to Trader Joes and bought the multi pack of the water. Immediately upon getting in the car I started drinking the water. The first few sips hurt just like everything else but within 15 minutes into my drive home I could feel the burn decrease. I stopped at a restaurant to grab a bite to eat and 20 minutes into the meal the burn was back. I finished that bottle last night and felt a HUGE difference. Got another bottle to drink during the night and right now I'm on my 3rd bottle in 24 hours and feel amazing. GERD who???? I had fried chicken today and nothing. I've read the responses and perhaps it doesn't work for some but it works for me. And I believe in drinking water. My daily goal is a gallon and it's not often I don't reach it. I use freshly squeezed lemons and mint leaves with 4 of the bottles, so I know I'm hydrated. This water has helped and I don't feel like I have a dry mouth.

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  28. Rakewell is a doctor who has put in the time and effort to educate himself and certainly would be considered an expert in his medical field and should be shown respect for all he has done and achieved. Doctors have the benefit of "practice" where they can learn a lot....after all, it is what they do. This being said, experts once thought the world was flat, until we discovered it is round. We should ALL be humble enough to admit, we may not really know. The majority of science is theory and the majority of what we believe about our health, biology and chemistry is based on these theories. Correlation is not causation. I am not a doctor or a scientist. I am simply someone who has spent countless (literally countless) hours researching an incredible amount of information. I have done so for the love of learning. One thing I have discovered, for every opinion or theory, there is someone who is there to debunk it. I think gaining knowledge is incredibly important, the more information you gain from different sources the better to analyze through a critical mind. I'll give you two great examples of things that truly surprised me that most have never even heard about: the first is the Perth Group and the team behind the website Rethinking Aids. I could write so much on this, but in short, the fact is (according to these prestigious scientists) the HIV virus has never been isolated and the concept of a virus being the cause of AIDS (which is a real condition)is shaky at best. If this group is correct, millions have been given the terror of being diagnosed with a virus that has never been proven to exist and believe they will die from it (as the good doc pointed out, their subconscious mind will make a reality of this belief). The second is breathing. We are all told CO2 is a toxic byproduct of breathing. Based on my research - it plays a critical role in oxygenating the body. Over breathing (getting rid of too much CO2) could be a major cause of an unhealthy ph system as well as low body oxygen (which would lead to many diseases). Dr. Buteyko was a Russian doctor tasked by the Soviets during the cold war to study breathing to help astronauts. He is quite famous and you should look at his work. There is a book called the Oxygen Advantage written by an athletic trainer who teaches how to apply his methods to world class athletes. You might say to yourself, breathing, really...I do it 24/7. This is true, but we all eat and drink every day, yet we know what we put in our body can truly affect us...the same is true for how we breathe...you'd be surprised.

    Back to this topic, the majority of oxygen in our body IS from the water we drink and it should be the very best you can afford. Water is a critical source of healing and well being...this forum is awesome because it shows people are talking about their health and questioning the things we are told by both corporations and individuals...

    There is a saying I had read: 'the doctor dresses the wound but God heals it' - doctors are only one resource. They are human and can only share what they have learned or experienced, but that is certainly a limited scope. Your intuition is your greatest resource. Start asking yourself, what do I think is right based on what I know - when trying to make a decision. The question "why" is powerful. Ask a doctor why do you think I have this diagnosis? Why do you think this is the best treatment? Over time the voice your highest self will imprint upon you. All you can ever do is make your very best decision based on what you know at that time. It might change tomorrow, but at least you are taking control of your health and life...

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  29. How about using this as a tool to balance other delicate ph liquids? Coffee and tea are generally acidic and this can potentially have very unique flavor impacts. I don't drink it for my health, but for the flavorant impact on delicately balanced liquids.

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  30. I drink Trader Joe's alkaline water for GERD/LPR. My filtered tap water tested at ph 4.5, much too acidic for an LPR sufferer! Don't forget the throat tissue is being attacked by acid by food/liquids going down and coming back up the esophagus, so at least I know the alkaline water going down won't be irritating my throat with excess acid. The articles claiming ph water is a scam neglect to point out that LPR sufferers need non-acidic drinks/food to heal their irritated throats. Additionally, there was a report on the news a few months back that the PPI's like Nexium can cause heart attacks and atrial fibrillation, so any natural methods to control GERD/LPR are certainly better than the side effects of the PPI's.




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  31. This Rakewell guy is obviously a promoter for some pharmaceutical or bigger business company. Alkaline water has worked on numerous problems for many different people as well as an ex girlfriend of mine. She would have IBS attacks a couple of times per week. Started drinking only alkaline water and never had one again. I've myself had heartburn and it almost immediately went away after slugging down a half liter of alkaline water. People can say and think what they want from all their theories, science and math equations, but when you have statistical evidence from multiple sources regarding the benefits of a simple action and reaction, there you have it. Alkaline water is good for you over other tap and commercialized bottled bull shit. Case Closed

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  32. The benefits of Alkaline water can be understood if you read the books Dropping Acid and Dr. Koufman's Acid Reflux Diet both written by Dr. Jamie Koufman. Here is a link to her website. http://www.voiceinstituteofnewyork.com/

    When you learn about Acid Reflux and Silent Reflux you will quickly see how important and beneficial High Ph water is to washing away harmful Pepsin that is in reflux and is deposited in the esophagus and vocal box. Pepsin is activated by acid and will eat into your tissues and cause granulomas and potentially cancer. Alkaline water is an essential part of a reflux diet. Alkaline water washes away the pepsin and also helps in PH balancing your foods. This reflux diet and approach is supported and recommended by Brigham and Women’s Hospital where I am a patient.

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  33. A Dr tells us to drink tap water instead of electrolyte or alkaline water. What a shocker coming from the same Dr's who MAKE MONEY off prescribing all sorts of drugs that guess what? Wind up destroying the very same kidneys this Dr is rambling on about.

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  34. I'm coming out somewhere in between. I'm sure some of the commenters have experienced turnarounds that could be attributable to alkaline water. Myself, I tried two bottles of Trader Joe's alkaline water months apart and I find it almost impossible to stomach. I feel it in my throat and for hours after I have even a sip, my throat and stomach feel awful. I googled it to see if other people had that reaction.

    As the daughter of a physician, I have two perspectives on this post and the comments.

    1. I sincerely doubt that anyone contradicting the blogger's conclusions has any grasp of science. I didn't see a lot of scientific disagreement, only anecdotal evidence and unexplained assertions like, I want to raise my urine pH to maintain a balanced internal environment. This is coming from one person who has no idea if her urine pH is supposed to be lower or higher than 7.4. You could argue all kinds of things that sound like they make sense, but the thing is, that's why we have scientists to test hypotheses that sound right but.. turn out to be completely unfounded and wrong. So if you don't understand the science, maybe don't be so confident that you're more right than a DOCTOR who is supporting his conclusions.. with facts.

    2. Many of the commenters seem to think doctors are all corrupt because they stand to benefit from big pharma. You're overstating the case. Doctors drink the Koolaid because they go to four years of MEDICAL school and learn to be MEDICAL doctors and practice MEDICINE. They don't go to nutritional school or exercise school or healthful environment school or psychological health school. They believe wholeheartedly in the usefulness of pills. There's a pill for everything, and there's studies showing what those pills do. So of course they go for the pill cure. It has nothing to do with Big Pharma. These guys by and large aren't making commissions for writing prescriptions to their patients. Sure, there are some docs out there who are paid by Big Pharma to do research or publicize the benefits of a profitable treatment. But that isn't every doctor. For the most part, you're just dealing with people who have never seriously studied alternative medicine, are brainwashed into thinking it's dangerous and ineffective, and don't believe in it. But I hardly would blame them: all the studies back them up! Could be that Big Pharma is manipulating those studies, but let's not assume evil motives on the part of people who sacrificed quite a bit of time and energy so they could help save people's lives.

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  35. Tap water has flouride! And more than that, all of the products that people consume everyday has flouride too! that's something everyone should be concerned too! flouride is very poisonous, even in toothpaste.

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  36. molecular hydrogen h2 infused water is the key behind health benefits there are lot of products in market that claim they make alkaline water why is some govt authority not evaluating all this atleast it is not saying it is bad dont drink it i respect any bodies opinion

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  37. They're coming to take this entire comment section away, ha ha.

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  38. I was drinking the Trader Joe's alkaline water and it made me so ill that my pancreas is not functioning properly and my GI doctor has been trying so hard to help me with this. I'm so stressed out because of this i can't even enjoy my favorite meals anymore, I have to meet with a nutritionist, take 6 pills a day,and it goes on and on. Trader Joe's alkaline water is not good for healthy neither unhealthy people,because I was a very happy and healthy person before the using the alkaline water.

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  39. I've been throwing up a lot, having frequent bathroom visits, sleepless nights and head aches.

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  40. Ironically this is the cheapest water on the market. Tap water will kill you! The TDS in tap water is insanely high and highly toxic. Bottled water all the way. Now as far as the PH claim the good doctor is on the money. However if he then says drink the toxic tap water and take the mercury enriched shots I think he's lost his sense. The other problem is that if Trader Joe is willing to lie to his customers about his water to stoop people into thinking he can manipulate the body's PH. He is certainly willing to let a few ions pass through his RO filters. So methinks we have a crisis here. A 32 oz $1 bottle of water is likely not as clean as you think it is.

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  41. I just did a pH test on this water as I do like it and have been drinking it now for 2 weeks. However I did a pH test on it and was shocked. If you have strips do the test!!!

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  42. FLOURIDE KILLS! Regarding flouride, anything that ends in "IDE" kills you! Homicide, suicide, pesticide, herbicide, infanticide, flouride, etc.

    And if anybody doesn't believe that doctors whore themselves out for the substantial kickbacks that big pharma pushes on them for over-prescribing, then you are blissfully ignorant. Take your pills and be docile.

    BTW, The Koine Greek word "farmacia", from which we get our word "pharmacy" is translated as "witchcraft" in ancient texts including the New Testament. From ancient times their "magical" potions were designed to keep people buying potions, not to cure them; just like the so-called "MEDICINE" of today.

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