# Chloramine in the Water Supply Worsens IBS



## Hip (Dec 26, 2012)

*IBS Significantly Improved by Removing Chloramine from Tap Drinking Water*

I strongly urge those with IBS to try this simple approach to dramatically improving their IBS symptoms.

Countries such as the US, UK, Canada and Australia use *chlorine* as the main disinfectant in drinking water supplies (as opposed to continental Europe, which uses ozone as the tap water disinfectant).

However, many water suppliers in the US, UK, Canada and Australia also add a secondary disinfectant called *chloramine* to the drinking water supply, in addition to chlorine.

I found that once I* removed this chloramine *from my tap water, *my IBS-D symptoms improved dramatically*.

Chloramine is more difficult to remove from drinking water than chlorine. Chlorine is easily removed from water just by boiling, which means that there will be no chlorine in hot drinks like tea or coffee, nor in cooked food. However, unlike chlorine, *chloramine is not removed by boiling water*, and carbon filters are not good at removing chloramine either.

Fortunately, there is a very simple method to remove chloramine from drinking water: just by adding *vitamin C*. Reference: here.

You only need a very small amount of vitamin C to completely neutralize the chloramine in your drinking water: around 10 mg (0.01 grams) of vitamin C will neutralize all the chloramine in one liter of water.

What I do is use these fizzy 1 gram vitamin C tablets that you can buy in most supermarkets and pharmacies, and break one tablet into tiny dozens and dozens of little pieces. I then just place one tiny piece of the vitamin C tablet into the water each time I boil a kettle, and into the tap water each time I use some for cooking or drinking.

That way, all the chloramine in the water will be completely neutralized before you drink it.

Note that not all water companies put chloramine into the tap water they supply: check on the web site of your water supplier to see whether your supplier uses chloramine or not. In the US, chloramine is added to about 20% of the drinking water supply. For the UK, here is a list of water suppliers that use chloramine.

*Taking the chloramine out of my tap water greatly improved by IBS-D*.

Hopefully removing chloramine from drinking water will benefit others with IBS too.


----------



## Trudyg (Aug 16, 2002)

I don't see any vit c in your link to the reference. I've had ibs for 50 years--on well water for a long time. Don't see this as a causative for me.


----------



## Hip (Dec 26, 2012)

Trudyg said:


> I don't see any vit c in your link to the reference. I've had ibs for 50 years--on well water for a long time. Don't see this as a causative for me.


I don't think chloramine is the cause of IBS, just an exacerbating factor, and if you remove this factor, your symptoms may well substantially improve.

Are you sure you cannot see the above vitamin C link? Here is the link again:

Google images of fizzy vitamin C tablets in a plastic tube


----------



## Milly1 (Apr 6, 2011)

Thanks for that info Hip. My water supply has been one of the things that has recently been bothering me and have gone over to bottled water for the last week........am still on antibiotics at the moment so when I stop those it'll be interesting to see if it makes a difference. Interestingly, my partner said the other day that his stomach isn't right when he comes to stay here so its either the water or him catching bugs from me!


----------



## Hip (Dec 26, 2012)

Milly1 said:


> Thanks for that info Hip. My water supply has been one of the things that has recently been bothering me and have gone over to bottled water for the last week........am still on antibiotics at the moment so when I stop those it'll be interesting to see if it makes a difference. Interestingly, my partner said the other day that his stomach isn't right when he comes to stay here so its either the water or him catching bugs from me!


In order to avoid chloramines (assuming your water utility puts them in the water), you really need to use bottled water for all your drinking and cooking water, including water used to make tea and coffee. Are you using bottle water for everything?

Of course you don't need to use bottled water necessarily: as described above, putting 10 mg of vitamin C per liter of tap water will neutralize the chloramines in that water.


----------



## Hip (Dec 26, 2012)

Another useful thread on the subject of irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) improving after removing chloramine from tap drinking water can be found here:

IBS Improved After Removing Chloramine From My Drinking Water


----------

