YOUR WATER HAS BEEN ON AN INCREDIBLE JOURNEY
From falling as rain and travelling miles through rivers and streams, the water that we drink has been on an incredible journey.
As river water flows through different landscapes and passes different landscapes it picks up a variety of contaminants.
Industrial areas can pollute river water will heavy metals, asbestos, particulates, and many other contaminants. In farming areas river and steam water will absorb nitrates from artificial fertilizers and even in pristine countryside bacterial contamination will be very high.
TECHNOLOGICAL ADVANCES HAVE MADE WATER TREATMENT
HIGHTLY SCIENTIFIC
Water treatment plants are highly scientific, but still work using the same principles first installed by our Victorian forebears.
Large grid water filtration to take out the larger objects, followed by holding chambers to separate solids from the liquid, with more filtration and the addition of chlorine to kill germs is as far as most water treatment facilities will go to ensure water is safe to drink.
DO YOU KNOW WHAT COULD BE IN YOUR DRINKING WATER?
We know that water treatment will remove larger solids and bacteria from dirty water.
However, most sewerage and water treatment centres still operate based upon the original Victorian guidelines, laid down in the late eighteen-hundreds when the majority of the sewerage system that we still use in the UK, was constructed.
Although they designed a robust system that still works well to provide clean water; our Victorian forebears were unaware of the poisonous effects of heavy metals, particularly lead, in drinking water. They would also never dream of forever chemicals in water like Ibuprofen and hormone treatments like the birth control pill and hormone replacement therapy; and plastic hadn’t been invented (and wouldn’t be for at least fifty years) so micro-plastic contamination in water wasn’t a consideration.
Which of course means that our water treatment does nothing to remove heavy metals, lead, Ibuprofen, hormones, and micro plastics (among other things) from our water.
IT IS NOT JUST VISIBLE PARTICLES THAT ARE A PROBLEM. MANY CONTAMINANTS ARE INVISIBLE TO THE NAKED EYE
We can’t see micro plastics in water, or lead and other heavy metals, or Ibuprofen or hormones, or even asbestos or parasitic cysts. There could be hundreds of contaminants hiding in plain sight, in what first appears to be a clean glass of tap water.
Only Doulton water filters have an independently tested, five stage filtration system that filters drinking water contaminants that are invisible to the naked eye.
DOULTON FILTRATION STAGE 1
Doulton’s one hundred percent natural, pure ceramic outer shell offers micro filtration that stops the following contaminants in their tracks:
PATHOGENIC BACTERIA LIKE TYPHOID, E-COLI, SHIGELLA AND CHOLERA (AMONG OTHERS)
All of these are well known and very nasty bacterial infections, some of which can kill people within hours of infection.
CYSTS, TURBIDITY AND PARTICLES
Turbidity is the cloudiness that can sometimes affect water, which along with water particles can offer a haven for bacteria.
Cysts are parasitic worms that coat themselves in a hard shell which protects them from the effects of chlorine added to water. These parasites are the most common form of water-based pathogen in the developed world, and if you are unfortunate enough to swallow one, you could be infected for up to 36 months. While most healthy adults can usually cope with the discomfort of diarrhea and sickness that accompany a cyst infection, immune compromised people and young children are at greater risk of serious disease.
There are several microscopic parasites that can create the hard shell of a cyst around themselves including CRYPTOSPORIDIUM and GIARDIA.
DIRT, RUST and SEDIMENT
Dirt, sediment, and rust particles can enter water from older or leaking pipes, and this is something that could occur at any point from the water treatment centre to your kitchen tap! In England and Wales alone, we lose three billion litres of water through pipe leakage every single day. That’s a lot of holes in pipes! And this results in plenty of opportunity for dirt, rust and other contaminants to enter the remaining water while in the pipe, contaminating our clean water supply.
DOULTON FILTRATION STAGE 2
Once the ceramic has blocked bacteria, cysts, rust, sediment, dirt, and particles; Doulton’s enhanced anti-bacterial properties come into play.
The outer ceramic layer of every Doulton filter element is impregnated within the structure of the ceramic with pure silver metal to inhibit micro-biological growth. This ensures that the ceramic filter remains an inhospitable environment for pathogens throughout its usage.
DOULTON FILTRATION STAGE 3
The water that has moved through the ceramic shell then meets the Doulton Activated Carbon block as the next stage of our filtration process.
This activated carbon is designed to take out chlorine, which not only removes the ‘swimming pool’ taste and smell of municipal water, but in removing the chlorine, makes the water much healthier to drink.
CHLORINE
Chlorine is added to water to kill germs, and it’s very good at that, the trouble is it keeps killing germs even after we’ve swallowed it – meaning that chlorine in our water can wipe out our good gut bacteria, irritating IBS type conditions and weakening our immune systems.
MONOCHLORMINE
Monochloramines can cause breathing to become congested and cause sneezing, blocked sinus, coughing, choking, wheezing, shortness of breath and asthma. These problems are most encountered in swimming pools but can be experienced anywhere Chloramines are used.
Doulton filters away up to 99% of both Chlorine and Monochloramine from tap water, leaving it gentle enough for anyone to drink safely.
PHENOLS
Exposure to phenols may cause irritation to the skin, eyes, nose, throat, and nervous system. Some symptoms of exposure to phenol are weakness, exhaustion, muscle aches, and pain.
POLYAROMATIC HYDROCARBONS
Iincreased incidences of lung, skin, and bladder cancers are associated with exposure to this chemical.
TRIHALOMETHANES
These chemicals are created because of a reaction between the chlorine used for disinfecting tap water and natural organic matter in water. At elevated levels, THMs have been associated with negative health effects such as cancer and adverse reproductive outcomes.
Doulton filters reduce the above chemicals by up to 95%.
DOULTON FILTRATION STAGE 4
The next stage in Doulton’s multistage filtration (offered in a single ceramic filter!) is the reduction of heavy metals from our unique heavy metal reduction media, which neutralises lead, cadmium and mercury.
LEAD
One of the main potential risks of long term lead poisoning can be through drinking tap water if your property has lead pipes, a lead water tank or pipework with lead fittings. This can result in lead contaminating the water supply.
Exposure to lead can be harmful especially to unborn babies and young children. Children absorb more lead than adults due to their growing bones and other organs which lead can become deposited in.
The signs and symptoms of lead poisoning in children can include:
· Developmental delay
· Learning difficulties
· Irritability and fatigue
· Loss of appetite and weight loss
· Abdominal pain
· Vomiting
· Constipation
· Hearing loss
MERCURY
The primary health effect of mercury in water is impaired neurological development. Therefore, cognitive thinking, memory, attention, language, and fine motor and visual spatial skills may be affected in people who were exposed to mercury in water as children or while in the womb. Mercury also negatively affects adults’ cognitive ability, (the Mad Hatter from the Alice in Wonderland story is a famous example of a character that shows the long term effects of Mercury poisoning).
CADMIUM
Short term exposure to high cadmium levels in water can cause coughing, chest pain, vomiting and diarrhea. Whereas long term exposure can cause lung damage, kidney disease and convulsions. Exposure to lower levels of cadmium for a long time can cause fragile bones that break easily.
DOULTON FILTRATION STAGE 5
LIMESCALE
The final stage of the world leading water filtration offered by Doulton ceramic water filters is a slow-release scale inhibition, which gently softens drinking water by reducing water hardness and inhibits limescale build up to protect pipes, taps and appliances.
Use Doulton ceramic water filters in your home to stay protected from all of the above contaminants, and get safe, clean, healthy, great tasting water on tap.