Wednesday, April 16, 2008

Water, Water Everywhere but...

Is it safe? It turns out that water is everywhere. It covers most of the earth's surface, it's a major component up to 90% of the foods we eat and it is certainly crucial to us as it is in every cell of our bodies. Without it, we die, and relatively fast.

We should all be concerned with the purity of the water we drink. We suggest you carefully investigate the purity of city drinking water and how safely it is delivered to you through city water systems. Many people believe that the water coming out of our taps is pure and safe. In fact, there is no guarantee that it is. Pure drinking water is increasingly hard to find and that fact is made clear when we see how many companies are selling huge quantities of high-priced, ostensibly "'pure" bottled drinking water. Drinking bottled water does not guarantee you are drinking pure water. A recent comprehensive test of several popular bottled waters showed that most are not as pure as they advertise. A number were seriously contaminated. Only two passed the purity test.

There may be many contaminants in our drinking water, pollutants that can be very detrimental to our health. Not only bacterial and viral contaminants are often found in water, but also heavy metals, pesticides, fertilizers, herbicides, excess minerals, chlorine by-products, plastics, fuels, pharmaceuticals, human and animal waste, volatile organic chemicals, radioactive radon gas, dozens of types of parasites and other pollutants are found in many supposedly "pure" water systems. Some contaminants may be picked up in water storage tanks in the delivery system after the city's initial purification process takes place. In our own city, for example, drinking water passes through as many as nine large holding tanks before it is delivered to us.

What can we do to assure that we are drinking truly pure water? Answers: Search for a source of pure water by looking for companies that post-process city water using multi-filtration methods including reverse osmosis, micro-filters, carbon filters and UV germ killing methods to produce their pure water. If you cannot find such water purification companies in your area, consider buying an under-sink, three element water filtration system that will deliver purer water to you from the tap. Take along small bottles your own pure water when eating out. We have noted that most water served in restaurants is heavily laced with chlorine.

Drink 6-8 glasses of purified water per day. If you are more active, you may require more. For the best hydration drinks anywhere, try Brazil Botanical's two, pure water-based drinks: Vitela and ISO-5. Both drinks contain young coconut water as well as pure water. Young coconut water is also an isotonic, natural water, purified by Mother Nature. Isotonic means that it penetrates all human tissues as rapidly as blood plasma does and quickly hydrates human cells.

Dr. Tim also counsels you to avoid all caffeine-laden energy drinks and cola products. Many such drinks are also full of health-damaging sucrose sugar and do a poor job of hydrating our cells. The false sugar and caffeine energy "rush" many of them bring on may arrive fast, but it never lasts long. Stay healthy! Drink pure water!

Tuesday, April 15, 2008

Drink Diet Drinks with Artificial Sweeteners and Get Fatter and Ruin Your Health

Seems like most everyone, nearly 60% of users of soda drinks, are hooked on diet drinks, under the false belief that such drinks are good for you and can help you lose weight. Recent studies now prove that the very opposite is true. It’s no coincidence that over 60% of the population suffer from metabolic disorders and are overweight and obese. The obesity epidemic is real and is spreading rapidly ever since diet foods and artificial sweeteners became popular.

A recent study of more than 80,000 women showed that those that used artificial sweeteners put on more weight per year than those who did not use them. Other studies found that the artificial sweeteners trick the body into believing that there are incoming sugar calories that need to be processed by the digestive system. But there are no calories in the artificial sweeteners for the body to deal with. Our bodies crave calories and it has been found that people eat three times more calories and gain more weight when they regularly use foods and drinks containing the artificial sweeteners as compared to those consuming natural sugars in food and drinks.

Another serious side effect of ingesting too many artificial sweeteners are wide mood swings experienced by many people. They get an initial rush followed by a low or depression. One sweetener, widely used in many foods and drinks, is aspartame, a drug that may cause damage to the central nervous system. Aspartame in the digestive tract is converted into aspartic acid and phenylanine, plus wood alcohol (a dangerous poison) and formaldehyde (embalming fluid). Both of the latter two are poisonous to humans. Aspartame accounts for the majority of adverse reactions reported to the FDA.

Not only aspartame, but saccharin, acesulfame K, tagatose, wonda, Sweet and Low, Splenda, Equal, Nutrasweet, Talim, and other “new” artificial sweeteners are potentially detrimental to human health. Be sure to read product labels before choosing to use products with artificial sweeteners. If you wish to protect yourself and your family, avoid diet drinks and foods that contain artificial sweeteners and start your real diet with healthy and natural fruit, fruit juices, vegetables, grains, nuts, seeds and legumes.

Our Brazil Botanicals fruit juices and hydration drinks do not contain any artificial sweeteners and are pure, healthy drinks. Dr. Tim recommends them.