Health and medical news Blog
Welcome to our look into the world of healthy lifestyle
-
There are two major problems in choosing a filter. Firstly, it is impossible to tell if the product is working properly, without chemical analyses, although if it has a serious defect, a smell of chlorine in the filtered water might be noticeable. Secondly, there are no British Standards for domestic water filters at present. As a customer, you therefore need to be well informed about what you are buying. Some of the filters at present on the market actually remove very few contaminants from the water supply. Others may work well at first, but their performance drops off sharply – long before they have filtered the number of gallons claimed by the manufacturer.
The only country to apply consumer standards to domestic water filters is the USA, where the Environmental Protection Agency requires filters impregnated with silver to be registered and sets a limit on how much silver can leach into the water. In Britain, the Water Research Centre operates an approval scheme for some aspects of water filters, but not for their overall performance. It seems likely that the approval scheme in Britain will be improved in the next few years.
The vast majority of water filters bought in Britain are of the jug type. The advantage of these is that the initial outlay is very low (£10-15). The cost per gallon is between 12 pence and 30 pence, which is cheaper than bottled water, although the taste of the water is not as good.
The prime objective of the jug filters is to improve the taste and appearance of water, and to remove hardness (calcium carbonate or ‘chalk’) so that kettles do not
become lined with scale. They contain an activated carbon filter to remove chlorine and another component, an ion exchange resin, which takes out the calcium carbonate. The latter component also removes lead and some other metals. Calcium carbonate is not injurious to health and cannot cause sensitivity reactions, so it is the kettle that benefits rather than the drinker.
*420\180\8*
Tags: Allergies
-
Once you have felt consistently better for three or four days then you should start the reintroduction phase. Don’t delay doing this. Write down exactlv how you feel at this point – it may be useful and encouraging to refer back to this later if you suffer a lot of reactions during food testing.
Feeling much bettei- quite quickly
This can happen, especially in children and young people – they seem to miss out on the withdrawal symptoms. Go on to the reintroduction phase.
Feeling much better, but with one or two lingering symptoms It looks as if you have cut out your main offending foods, but are still eating something that is a problem (assuming that you have ruled out all other problems, such as candidiasis, airborne allergens, hyperventilation and environmental chemicals. Think again about your previous eating habits – is there anything you used to eat quite frequently and are still eating? Cut all these out.
If your symptoms clear, then go on to the reintroduction phase immediately. If they don’t, then the best option is to go on to a full ‘rare-food diet’, only eating foods that you have never eaten before.
If the remaining symptoms are mild, and fairly constant from day to day, then you could go on to the reintroduction phase – you may get some sort of useful result from testing. If you can discover which foods are the main source of trouble, and establish a diet on which you are reasonably well, then you are in a good position to investigate further. It could be that the remaining symptoms are due to some other problem – see below, under Feeling about the same, for a list of possibilities.
*373\180\8*
Tags: Allergies
-
One thing that is thought to trigger off food intolerance is a heavy exposure to toxic chemicals. Such exposures are usually accidental and unforseen, of course, but there are some avoidable ones. If a house is to be sprayed with insecticides to eradicate woodworm, or with fungicides for wet or dry rot, then it is advisable to move out for at least a week, to allow time for the fumes to disperse. The company doing the spraying may claim that this is unnecessary, but there are instances of both children and adults being ill after spraying, even though they were not directly exposed to the spray. The fumes travel throughout the house, so even if only one part is being sprayed you should try to find somewhere else to stay for a while. Another hazard that can be very largely avoided is direct exposure to pesticides used on crops. If you see fields being sprayed, keep your distance, especially if they are being sprayed by a plane. The spray can easily drift. If you have a choice, don’t buy a house next to a large arable field. Avoid using sprays in your own garden and keep household chemicals to a minimum.
Finally, the general health measures listed on p290 are recommended to anyone who might be at risk of developing food intolerance. Above all, don’t ignore symptoms such as recurrent headaches, regular bouts of indigestion or persistent fatigue. Living on aspirin, antacids, or strong coffee is going to make the problem worse rather than better, and experience suggests that the decline into severe food intolerance is a very gradual one that begins with symptoms of this sort. Treating a mild form of food intolerance – the early stages – is a great deal easier than trying to tackle entrenched symptoms and multiple sensitivities. The longer you leave it the more difficult it may be.
*326\180\8*
Tags: Allergies
-
It would appear, from more recent studies, that food additives are important in a great many children with hyperkinetic syndrome, but that it is unusual to find a child for whom additives are the sole problem. Most also show sensitivity to various commonly eaten foods, pollen, dust, other common allergens and chemicals. The role of natural salicylates seems to be a minor one. When food and other allergens are considered, as well as additives, 50-80 per cent of children respond, although not all of them are completely cured. Sensitivity to unavoidable synthetic chemicals, such as solvents and the contaminants of natural gas, may account for the partial success with some patients.
Although Feingold’s theory was not entirely right, he was correct to single out food additives for blame – they do seem to play a disproportionate role in hyperactivity, compared to other types of illness such as asthma or eczema. This suggests that enzyme deficiencies may contribute to hyperkinetic syndrome, because such additives need to be detoxified by the body’s enzymes. They may also prevent some enzymes from working properly. The involvement of additives may explain why the incidence of hyperkinetic syndrome seems to have increased dramatically in the last 20 years – a period that has seen the meteoric rise of junk food’, take-aways and instant-everything. All these convenience foods tend t6 be rich in colourings, flavourings, preservatives and other additives.
*275\180\8*
Tags: Allergies
-
Enzymes are specialized molecules found only in living things (the ones in biological washing powders are extracted from living things). They are absolutely essential to life, because they make specific chemical reactions happen. For example, they join other molecules together to build up the cells that make up living bodies. They also break down food (digestive enzymes), so that the energy it contains can be utilized, and break down toxins (detoxification enzymes) to make them harmless. They transform surplus food into fat stores, or break down the fat to yield energy when food is short.
Although they cannot be seen, even under a microscope, there are hundreds of thousands of different enzymes in the human body. Each enzyme has a very specific job to do: most of them only control one reaction, although others are slightly more versatile. For example, some of the digestive enzymes can break
down a variety of food molecules of the same general type. Enzymes themselves are controlled by smaller molecules which can turn a particular enzyme on or off.
Enzymes are just one type of protein molecule. Like all proteins, enzymes are made according to an inherited pattern which is passed on from parent to child. This pattern is stored in the genetic material, the DNA. In fact, DNA acts as a template, from which all enzymes and other protein molecules are made. If there is a change in the DNA – a mutation – then the enzyme which is coded for by that part of the DNA will be altered. Usually these changes are for the worse, and the enzyme does not work as well as the original version. What sort of effect this enzyme defect has will depend on how important the enzyme is, what sort of reaction it controls and how badly it has been affected. Defective enzymes may play a part in food intolerance.
*27\180\8*
Tags: Allergies