You probably don’t even think of what is actually coming out of your shower head when you turn on the water and start lathering your loofah. But Biology Professor Norman Pace of the University of Colorado claims that even if you shower by yourself, you’re not alone: millions of microorganisms and bacteria are piled up inside your unfiltered shower head, ready do rain down on you the minute you turn the faucet handle.
Pace lead a study in which 50 showerheads from across the country were tested to see how much gunk (what they called biofilm) was building up inside and what exactly was crawling around in that gunk.
It seems like this is all you need to hear before you decide that you need a shower filter, but the benefits of installing one reach far beyond gross showerhead goo.
There are some pretty convincing cosmetic reasons for getting a shower head filter. The problem with having even trace amounts of chlorine in your shower water is that it bonds to the skin and hair, removing moisture and disrupting the balance of necessary, helpful bacteria that resides on your body.
People who switched to using a shower filter note that “the very first time you shower you can feel the difference in your hair and skin”. In other words, shower head filters make you look younger.
The chemical chlorine, used by water treatment facilities, reduces pathogenic bacteria in our water yet it’s byproducts are hazarous to our health. When chlorine reacts with organic matter in water it forms disinfectant byproducts, aka trihalomethanes (THMs) one of which is the cancer-causing chloroform.
It is often claimed that, when showering your pores open which leads to increased dermal absorption of toxic substances such as chlorine and its byproducts. By taking a shower without a water filter, you are even more susceptible to chlorine and chloramine than by merely drinking unfiltered water
The health risks caused by chlorine absorption are explained as follows in a paper by The Department of Community Health:
“The skin does not absorb chlorine well, but small amounts can pass through the skin when people are exposed to chlorine
gas, bleach, or come into contact with water or soil containing high levels of chlorine. Although small amounts of chlorine can pass through the skin, it is eliminated from the body rapidly. Chlorine may irritate or burn the skin, especially moist areas.”
Science News reported that researchers found increases in chloroform in study participants’ lungs of about 2.7ppb after a 10-minute shower. Combined with warm water opening pores, skin absorption and lung inhalation during a 10-minute shower showed to be greater than the amount that would be ingested by drinking 8 glasses of the same water.
Also, besides chlorine and chloroform there are other airborne chemicals that may be absorbed by open pores while showering. Generally, skin absorption and inhalation causes the chemicals to travel directly to the blood stream, contaminating your body quickly and causing irreparable damage.
A recent EPA rreport notes, “Virtually every home in America has a detectable level of chloroform gas in the air due to chlorine and showering.”
Even though study conclusions are sometimes inconclusive, the signs are clear. Chlorine and its byproducts are a cold hard fact and while showering you are exposed in two ways, dermal and via inhalation. So aside from the more aesthetic changes in your skin and hair, a quality shower filter helps protect your body on the inside.
Do you sometimes feel worse after a long, hot shower than when you first got in? It might be due to chlorine absorption and inhalation. Chlorine exposure can cause physical fatigue, mental depression, and a lowered autoimmune function, making it harder for your body to ward off infectious diseases and allergic reactions. A shower filter will get rid of those harsh vapors, strengthening your immune system and leaving your mind truly envigorated.
“Recently, showers have been suspected to be an important source of indoor exposure to volatile organic compounds (VOC’s)” Source: PubMed.
Vaporized, inhaled chlorine damages lungs. The Center for Disease Control confirms that people who take hot showers are more exposed to chlorine and its hazardous by-products than those who drink unfiltered tap water. This is because when the unfiltered water is heated, the chlorine turns into a gas and is absorbed into the skin or inhaled.
Various publications such as the books Never Fear Cancer Again: How to Prevent and Reverse Cancer and The American Health Hoax: The Surprising Truth About How Modern Medicine Keeps You Sick mention that; “Exposure to vaporized chlorine is 100 times more damaging than drinking chlorinated water”
Two separate studies, one in Massachusetts and one in Colorado, both determined that chlorine, as well as the by-product chloramine (which is chlorine mixed with ammonia) was present in water and was linked to an increase of deaths due to cancer in the bladder, kidneys, and rectum.
For women who are pregnant, a shower filter is vital in reducing chlorine exposure that may not only put the mother’s health at risk, but the unborn child as well.
Real conclusions can not be drawn from the limited studies, especially not since no studies specifically on the effects of showering in relation to pregnancy have been done. Considering the other health hazards it may be wise to be better safe than sorry though.
For children, a hot bath or shower with unfiltered municipal water could have dangerous effects on their development. In Belgium, a study was done to find out if there was any correlation between school children who spent time breathing the air in an indoor swimming pool and an increase in lung permeation and the development of asthma.
Children who played frequently at the pool had an increased risk of developing juvenile asthma, and in some cases the symptoms were severe.
Asthma and allergy sufferers are reported to have fewer attacks when using shower head water filters blocking the irritants. Even though outdoor air quality has improved the past decades asthma among children has increased by over 300%. Researchers think poor indoor air quality due to synthetic chemicals, especially from vaporized shower water, may be a cause.
Also remarkably, the incidence of sinus infections has significantly increased since the Spring of 1990. This is theorized to be likely caused by increased (indoor) air pollution and antibiotics use. Chlorine is known to cause inflammation of the sinus linings.
In our modern day industrialized society we use more than 75,000 toxic chemicals. Our public water supplies are known to contain 2100 of these. Most, if not all, of these toxins can be inhaled and absorbed while showering.
Considering that other common chemical pollutants, from laundry detergent, from modern building materials to certain foods, reducing our exposure to toxins is critically important to our health and well being. A shower filter can be a great and effective start in doing so.
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Your shower lifestyle changes, when the water changes!
Taking a shower is awesome, it makes you feel nice and clean, makes you sound like a great singer, and helps you make all of life’s decisions.
Anonymous
Chlorine. Who knew? Many knew. I didn’t know. I might have guessed.
Earlier this summer I attended the opening of a moving exhibition at the Tate Britain in London. Called ‘Aftermath’, it chronicles in eight rooms, the years following the cessation of hostilities in World War I – see ‘A Hundred Years Ago’ right here in janiqueel. Young soldier-poets, like Rupert Brooke, wrote about the gas attacks. In fact, his ‘Dulce et Decorum Est’ graphically describes the effects of chlorine:
Gas! Gas! Quick, boys!—An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And flound’ring like a man in fire or lime…
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
It gets worse. Readily accessed on the Net, the poem may put a stop to your dreams of participating in trench combat – especially combat involving chlorine gas. It should.
As you may have wondered more than once while reading janiqueel.com articles, ‘What on earth is she on about this time?’ I’m talking chlorine, in case you haven’t guessed. One asks, ‘Where might I encounter chlorine outside of the W.W.I battlefields of Ypres, Arras, Amiens, Verdun?’ IN YOUR SHOWER! I shout.
OK, I’m being a bit alarmist. I admit it. War poets (at least those who survived their various wars) will not memorialise your showers, nor should they. But now that I have your attention, I hope, let’s be honest about the creeping dangers of chlorine in the water you so joyfully pour all over your body. Without unduly causing anxiety, here are a few of the harmful effects of chlorine in our everyday lives:
It presents an increased risk of cancer;
It can be harmful for children’s health;
It can cause cell damage;
It increases the risk of asthma;
It can result in or accentuate heart problems;
It can cause bad taste or odors.
Why is there chlorine in our water? ‘Chlorine has long been used to disinfect our drinking water because it controls the growth of such unwelcome bacteria as E Coli and Giardia…Many animals, including humans need chlorine. But there is a limit to what we can physically tolerate.’ (c.f. Bioray – the Global Healing Center). It can also be absorbed through the skin while showering, for example.
There is an answer – a shower filter. Thankfully, chlorine is quite easily eliminated from household water. Refresh Wellness, a Singapore company, offers a filter at a reasonable cost, that is easily fitted to shower heads. Shower happily again. Make it a part of your healthy lifestyle. Given the importance of showering to most of us, taking a step to making it as conducive to good health as possible is a step in the right direction.
It can be also be attached to a sink tap, although perhaps not as convenient as unscrewing the shower head and fitting the filter between it and the water hose. Here, as in so many situations in life, a plumber’s advice can be awfully nice.
Refresh Wellness says, ‘Our shower filter neutralizes up to 99.9% of residual chlorine, metals and other harmful substances. Vitamin C improves water acidity level which helps in defying skin aging, while milk contents whiten and eliminate dark spots. The abundance of antioxidants help to defend against skin irritation and hair loss while rejuvenating your skin and hair. Pamper yourself now with our aromatherapy fragrance that relieves tension and stress during your shower.’
Put another way, the Refresh Wellness filter helps:
Delay skin aging;
Prevent hair loss;
Reduce skin irritation;
Regenerate collagen layer;
Relieve acne and eczema problems
Whiten and eliminate dark spots and freckles.
In addition to promoting good health for most users the Refresh Wellness filter is especially salubrious for babies with sensitive skin, the elderly with aging skin, teenagers who want to improve eczema and acne conditions, and working adults who want to delay skin aging and improve hair loss conditions. Correct me if I’m wrong, but that covers most of us, right?
Product choice is simple enough;
Refresh Milk Shower filter (Lavender)
Refresh Milk Shower filter (Lemon)
Refresh Shower filter (Unscented).
The first two involve vitamin C and the pleasing aromas of either lemon or lavender. Given my active lifestyle and my home in the tropics, I have been known to take more than one shower a day. How many? Ain’t sayin’!
Although it may seem a tad obsessive, taking the filter along on trips is not out of the question. Hotel and guest house shower heads are usually as accessible as the ones at home, but do check out the situation before plumbing too deeply the peculiarities of your rented bathroom. Things can go wrong – just sayin’.
Of our everyday experiences, few (IMHO) hold the simple joy of water sluicing across my skin. I might have been better off not knowing the harms of chlorine in water, but that die has been cast. Now that I know, it seems the Refresh Wellness Filter is the healthful complement to my daily (or more) ablutions.
Benefits of using milk and lemon
Milk contains lactic acid that will exfoliate and remove dead skin cells and the protein and enzymes in milk will help to moisturize our skin. In addition, it will help to soften the skin to allow the lemon juice to better penetrate. Lemon juice is acidic and on top of also exfoliating the skin, it works as a bleaching agent to help fade uneven pigmentation.
You do not need to use body lotion anymore.
Get a moist and smooth skin from using only (RW) Refresh wellness LEMON MILK shower!
