Hard water has some fantastic health benefits that seem to encourage longer life expectancy and improved health. In this article we'll discover why this is so and what areas of the world have some of the longest life expectancy.An episode of Oprah recently looked at some of the so-called blue-zones around the world. These are places in the world where people live the longest and are the healthiest anywhere on earth. If we can take some of what they do and make those healthy moves a consistent part of our own lives, perhaps we could live a little longer (and be healthier in our old age) as well.
The first stop was the Nicoya Peninsula in the rain forest of Costa Rica. There are lots of very healthy centenarians there, possibly because of the excellent hard water, which is full of calcium and magnesium, keeping their bones and muscles strong throughout their lives.
A lot of physical labor still goes into food production there, from clearing fields to raise crops to picking fruit and grinding corn for tortillas, which is a great upper-body workout. In fact, people who live in this region have some of the best physical stamina in the world because they are always on the move. People eat lots of corn, beans and squash, and there is fresh fruit almost year-round.
Another important piece of the longevity puzzle in Costa Rica and elsewhere is a sense of community and family ties. Older people live with their younger relatives, and those connections help keep people feeling young and in touch with their surroundings.
The World Health Organization says, "There does not appear to be any convincing evidence that water hardness causes adverse health effects in humans."
Some studies have shown a weak inverse relationship between water hardness and cardiovascular disease in men, up to a level of 170 mg calcium carbonate per liter of water. So again a small amount of these calcium and magnesium minerals can actually be helpful for improved life expectancy. Other studies have shown weak correlations between cardiovascular health and water hardness. The World Health Organization has reviewed the evidence and concluded the data were inadequate to allow for a recommendation for a level of hardness.
In a review by Frantisek Kozisek, M.D., Ph.D. National Institute of Public Health, Czech Republic he gives a good overview of the topic, and unlike the WHO, sets some recommendations for the maximum and minimum levels of calcium (40-80 mg/L) and magnesium (20-30 mg/L) in drinking water, and a total hardness expressed as the sum of the calcium and magnesium concentrations of 2-4 mmol/L.
Hard water is not a health hazard. In fact, the National Research Council states that hard drinking water generally contributes a small amount toward total calcium and magnesium human dietary needs. They further state that in some instances, where dissolved calcium and magnesium are very high, water could be a major contributor of calcium and magnesium to the diet.
So although hard water can cause those annoying hard water stains around the home we all know about, the minerals contained in it may also be helpful to build strong bones and may improve cardiovascular disease.
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