Chlorine Kills Article: CLICK HERE

Chlorine vapors weaken lungs' ability to fight off allergies, study finds

updated 9:35 a.m. ET, Thurs., Sept. 25, 2008

- Swimming in outdoor chlorinated pools appears to increase the odds a child will develop asthma, researchers said on Thursday.

Other studies have linked chlorine and asthma but the new findings published in the European Respiratory Journal cast doubt on the idea outdoor pools are safer than indoor ones where chlorine vapors remains trapped inside an enclosed space.

"The more you swim, the higher the risk," said Alfred Bernard, a toxicologist at Catholic University of Louvain in Brussels, who led the study. "What is new in this study is that we looked at outdoor pools for the first time."

Asthma, which affects more than 300 million people worldwide, is the most common pediatric chronic illness. Symptoms include wheezing, shortness of breath, coughing and chest tightness.

Bernard and colleagues showed that outdoor pools are just as or more risky than indoor ones because harmful vapors remain at the pool surface and do not drift away.

And because children tend to spend more time in pools they are more likely to swallow chlorinated water or ingest vapors containing chemicals that attack the cellular barriers protecting the lung from allergens, Bernard said. "We see that the risk of the outdoor pool is equal and even higher than indoor pools because children tend to spend longer in outdoor pools and they are more chlorinated," he said.

The Belgian team tested 847 students around the age of 15 for allergies and asthma and asked their parents about exposure to asthma risks such as tobacco smoke, pets and pollution, and how much time the children had spent in chlorinated pools.

The researchers determined that the risk for the 80 percent of children predisposed to allergies and asthma was directly related to the amount of time spent in a pool.

Children with the highest pool attendance — one hour per week for 10 years — were five times more likely to be asthmatic than young people who had never swum in a pool, the study found.

"Young children are more exposed because they take more water into their airways and their lungs are still developing," Bernard said in a telephone interview.

Copyright 2008 Reuters
 

NaturalNews.com article

Originally published July 31 2008

Chlorine Chemicals in Swimming Pool Send Children to the Hospital

by David Gutierrez

(NaturalNews) More than 20 people were taken to the hospital after being exposed to dangerously high levels of chlorine at a Chicago-area swimming pool.

Roughly 200 people were at the New Mayan Adventure water park in the Holiday Inn Chicago-Elmhurst on Jan. 21, Martin Luther King Jr. Day, including dozens of children who had the day off from school. At approximately 1:15 p.m., children began vomiting, coughing, bleeding from the nose and fainting.

Eighteen ambulances were sent to collect 22 people who showed signs of chemical burns around their mouths and eyes. Six of the patients were also experiencing more dangerous symptoms of chlorine exposure.

More than half of those taken to the hospital were children.

Authorities said they would investigate the cause of the incident, which was probably either a chemical leak in the chlorination equipment or swimming pool that had been treated with too much of the chemical.

Chlorine accidents at swimming facilities are more common than most people realize. On Jan. 15, 10 people were hospitalized after concentrated chlorine spilled into a swimming pool and West Yorkshire, England. Three days earlier, 50 people had to be evacuated from a swimming pool in Canmore, Canada, after a chlorine gas leak caused burns in one man's throat.

"There was a mix-up in the pool," said Canmore Mayor Ron Casey. "Someone handling chlorine had inadvertently mixed the chlorine with another chemical, which caused a reaction, and so they evacuated the building right away."

On Dec. 21, a fire fighter in Glenbrook, Australia, had to be hospitalized for chemical burns on his feet that he acquired while evacuating a swimming pool due to a chlorine gas leak. The fire fighter had been wearing protective Hazmat clothing, but the gas still managed to seep through his protective shoes and injure his feet.

March 25, 2008

Dear Terry Brady:

This is a follow-up to a recent article you wrote on our Chlorine Free water Purifcication Systems.

Since your article posted in the Newspress we have been receiving inquiries about recent news reports regarding pharmaceuticals in our drinking water and protecting ourselves from them.

It is truly disturbing and unfortunate that our city municipal water supply is being contaminated by massive levels of chlorine, additives, toxins and drugs.

The Water Quality Association has recently recognized that water purification systems that use oxidation remove many of these contaminates from your home water. See attached article. Basically they are saying that the most cost effective and efficient approach to removal of pharmaceuticals is Point of Entry purification Systems using “advanced oxidation” and “long contact activated carbon”.

As you know Chlorine Free USA is a distributor of Chlorine Free Water Treatment Systems for your home, pool or spa.  We provide “Oxygenated” chemical free water. Our systems are state of the art, Point of Entry Systems using Oxidation and Ionization with multi-media filtration.

Our Point of Entry (whole house) Water Treatment System employs advanced oxidation and long contact activated carbon. These treatments are specifically designed to address organics in the water, into which category most drugs fall.

While there are no standards or consensus to test City Water, we feel that we are well ahead of the curve. 

Please take time to visit our website at www.chlorinefreeusa.com and download our free brochure. Or contact us at 1-800-517-0773.

Thank you,

Phil Francisco

Chlorine Free USAwww.chlorinefreeusa.com 1-800-517-0073

Green Bytes: A Greener, Cleaner Pool

By Alethea Kehas

Did you know you can have a green pool without the algae? Well, maybe not the color green, but how about swimming in water that is pure enough to drink? In my search for pool treatment options that are gentle on the environment and on humans, I discovered a method that sounds almost too good to be true.

Before I proceed though, I want to acknowledge that pool maintenance is becoming more sophisticated, allowing the use of lower levels of chlorine with salt generators, or the option of a gentler disinfection with biaguanides. But, if you are truly striving for an environmentally-friendly swimming experience, it’s hard to top a pool filled with drinkable water. In all due respect to the other options, I have chosen to review what I see to be the greenest approach to pool care available today. 

Based on a concept designed by NASA, a few companies have developed oxidation/ionization systems for pool sanitization.  The systems operate using low D/C voltage electrical current (don’t worry, there is no risk to swimmers) to split water to form oxygen atoms and hydroxyl ions, which attack dead organic matter and oils in the pool. The water molecules are then passed over copper plates to create copper ions, which are effective in controlling algae and fungus. The copper ions are kept at 0.5 to 0.7 (which is less than 25% of the require intake of copper daily) parts per million and pose no risk to humans. The result: drinkable water free of chemicals, bacteria and algae (these systems are also sold for household water purification).

The environment, your body and your power bill all benefit from ionization/oxidation systems. Unlike many pool care options available today, which rely on huge amounts of energy to run generators, these power units require only 35-50 watts to maintain a 20,000 gallon pool.

According to Bill Gilles, an engineer and the president of Chlorine Free USA, http://www.chlorinefreeusa.com, their CL Free Digital Water Systems (which sell for $2400-$5,000) if maintained correctly, should not require the use of additional chemicals unless there is a pervasively high concentration of organic material. For example, if you have leaves or pine needles regularly falling into your pool or if your dog(s) likes to swim laps, you may have to supplement with small amounts of non-chlorine shock to achieve a proper balance. They even have a system that will automatically balance the pH using Co2 in place of muriatic acid.

I spoke with two CL free customers to hear what they thought of their green pools. Jerry Naber, who lives in Arizona, has had no trouble with the CL Free system he had installed five years ago. He switched from a salt-water system to a CL Free system. Although he enjoyed his salt water pool, his CL free system got rid of his algae blooms, required less maintenance and allowed him to use pool backwash to water his plants.

Debbie McCurdy, who also lives in Arizona, had her system installed two years ago (systems can be self-installed) and absolutely loves it. For McCurdy, who previously swam in chlorine, there is no going back. The first time she stepped into her newly oxygenated, chemical-free pool, she felt as though her body was immersed in liquid velvet. Hmmm, velvet water…I could get used to that.