Information here has been
provided by a chemist who worked at the Department of chemistry at Simon Fraiser University of Canada
What most of these companies actually sell are grossly overpriced electrical devices that claim to produce "ionized" and alkaline water by the process of electrolysis. Many of these "water ionizers" appear to have their origins in Japan and Korea, two countries whose populations seem to be particularly susceptible to being taken in by pseudo scientific (def. beliefs mistakenly regarded as being based on scientific method) water-treatment schemes. In North America, distribution of these dubious devices has depended largely on multi-level marketing schemes that enroll science-ignorant dealers to exploit even-more-vulnerable consumers while enabling the manufacturer to maintain a low profile to regulatory agencies such as the FTC.
It doesn't help that quackery-filled "alternative health" books such as pH Miracle Living and Alkalize or Die by "Doctor" Theodore Baroody (whose scientific credentials seem highly dubious) plug alkaline water as one way of preventing cancer or of increasing one's lifespan. There is even a company that offers complete "alkaline diets" for which they make ridiculous claims. Even the otherwise respectable Kurzweil and Grossman's Fantastic Voyage (see below) goes off the track on this craze.
In multi-level marketing scams, the parent company keeps a low profile and makes few claims that would attract the scrutiny of regulators such as the U.S. FTC. Instead, they recruit thousands of "independent agents" who are provided with sales literature containing false and misleading claims which they then transmit to their customers or put up on their own Web sites. These agents, few of whom are well-enough educated to evaluate these claims or to realize that they violate the FTC rules on deceptive advertising, are as much victims as are their consumer customers.
Consider, for example, this outright lie that can be found at some Kangen Water sales sites:
"It is well known in the medical community that an overly acidic body is the root of many common diseases, such as obesity, osteoporosis, diabetes, high blood-pressure and more..." link
To further mislead science-naïve readers, another Kangen page employs the common ruse of misrepresenting the 1931 Nobel Prize work of a famous pioneer of biochemistry. Don't believe any of this deceptive garbage! (Note: Kangen is frequently misspelled as "Kangan".)
You won't find anything about the benefits of alkaline water in any standard textbook on nutritional biochemistry, and anyone with training in physiology or biochemistry would consider the claims in favor of it ludicrous, but the alkaline/ionized water quacksters and promoters have woven a network of scientific-sounding nonsense and outright lies in order to convince a gullible and scientifically-naïve public that drinking partially electrolyzed water (produced by their over-priced "machines") is the key to health.
The bottom line
Here, in a nutshell, are a few basic facts that I believe anyone with a solid background in chemistry or physiology would concur with:
* "Ionized water" is nothing more than sales fiction; the term is meaningless to chemists.
* Pure water (that is, water containing no dissolved ions) is too unconductive to undergo significant electrolysis by "water ionizer" devices.
* Pure water can never be alkaline or acidic, nor can it be made so by electrolysis. Alkaline water must contain metallic ions of some kind — most commonly, sodium, calcium or magnesium.
* The idea that one must consume alkaline water to neutralize the effects of acidic foods is ridiculous; we get rid of excess acid by exhaling carbon dioxide.
* If you do drink alkaline water, its alkalinity is quickly removed by the highly acidic gastric fluid in the stomach.
* Uptake of water occurs mainly in the intestine, not in the stomach. But when stomach contents enter the intestine, they are neutralized and made alkaline by the pancreatic secretions — so all the water you drink eventually becomes alkaline anyway.
* The claims about the health benefits of drinking alkaline water are not supported by credible scientific evidence.
* "Ionized"/alkaline water is falsely claimed to be an anti-oxidant. It is actually an oxidizing agent, as can be seen by its ability to decolorize iodine (see video)
* There is nothing wrong with drinking slightly acidic waters such as rainwater. "Body pH" is a meaningless concept; different parts of the body (and even of individual cells) can have widely different pH values. The pH of drinking water has zero effect on that of the blood or of the body's cells.
* If you really want to de-acidify your stomach (at the possible cost of interfering with protein digestion), why spend hundreds of dollars for an electrolysis device when you can take calcium-magnesium pills, Alka-Seltzer or Milk of Magnesia?
* Electrolysis devices are generally worthless for treating water for health enhancement, removal of common impurities, disinfection, and scale control. Claims that "ionized" waters are antioxidants are untrue; hypochlorites (present in most such waters) are in fact oxidizing agents.
* Claims that "water ionizers are approved for use in Japanese hospitals" are misleading: these "approvals" merely attest to the machines' safety — that they will not electrocute you! My understanding is that the Japanese Health Ministry is highly critical of therapeutic claims made for alkaline water.
Source http://www.chem1.com/CQ/ionbunk.html
http://womenofgrace.com/newage/?p=780
