Water bottle danger

[NEOWatcher]

Ah, yes, another top headline at the moment.

Water bottle dangers (http://www.wkyc.com/news/health/health_article.aspx?storyid=71471)
:eek:

Experts say refilling your plastic bottles without washing them could eventually make you sick.
...
Other ways to keep your water bottle free from germs is too avoid sharing...


That's pretty much it. Why it's a story, and why it took an expert to say it is beyond me.

Time for me to go home and do the dishes....

[nauthiz]

That story would have been a lot shorter if it were one paragraph instead of six one-sentence paragraphs with blank lines between them.

[Fazor]

I've always heard that you shouldn't refill water bottles, but I always have. Mind you, not for weeks-on-end. And I'm sorry, I don't need a news person nor a scientist to tell me not to put someone else's slobbered up bottle to my mouth.

I wonder when we'll get the study that tells us not to lick handrails in subway cars? Until then, I won't know not to do it!

[Tobin Dax]

That's why I try to get rid of them after a time, and why I empty them and give them a (very) quick rinse when I refill them. Haven't been sick yet because of it. I really need a new Brita pitcher after I move, though.

[BigDon]

Wow, just think of the tragic death toll caused by canteens...

[Peter Wilson]

That's why they have cantinas :rolleyes:

[mr obvious]

Sounds like a variant of the 'bottles-break-down-into-toxins' warning (see http://www.snopes.com/medical/toxins/petbottles.asp for example). However, increased germs does have a certain plausibility. I'd wish they'd cite a source rather than just claiming 'experts' said this or that.

[mike alexander]

My wife asked if she could take a swig from my water bottle. "No way, dear," I replied, and kissed her.

[tdvance]

My first time in Mexico, people had told me, "don't drink the water, use bottled water", so I did! After I finished the bottle, I refilled it (several times) from the sink in the hotel.

Well...I didn't get sick, must have been good water at the hotel.

Todd

[Noclevername]

Next thing you know, they'll be putting instructions on toothpicks...

[Paracelsus]

Well, as far as single-serving bottled water goes, the water in the bottles is no better than tap water, and drinking bottled water is very bad for the environment. As far as reusing old bottles goes, I worked in an infectious disease lab in grad school and ride the subway to work now, so I think I'm inured to most germs by now. ;)

[novaderrik]

i've had Gatorade bottles that lasted entire summers of getting refilled with untreated well water at work without ever getting washed. probably a couple gallons a day, 4 days a week, from about the end of April to maybe the middle of October.
i never got sick- but i did get rid of them at the end of the hot season or when the mineral coating on the inside of the bottle made it a nice tan color, whichever came first.

[mugaliens]

City water at 1 ppm and above is sufficient to kill most bugs provided a couple of drops of liquid dish soap is added along with warm water and shaken in the bottle.

If you're ridiculously paranoid, however, add half a capful of bleach and a tsp of liquid dish soap with hot water, cap, shake, and let sit overnight.

As for the "bottles," I just reuse my "wide mouth" soda bottles from the store. They're cheap (already paid for) and polycarbonate (nearly indestructible).

Why pay?

[crosscountry]

That's why I try to get rid of them after a time, and why I empty them and give them a (very) quick rinse when I refill them.


why refill something you've already used the one time?





I travel quite a bit and reuse waterbottles a lot. I hate paying 2 Euros for someone's idea of spring water, especially when it's not even enough to quench my thirst.

[crosscountry]

City water at 1 ppm and above is sufficient to kill most bugs provided a couple of drops of liquid dish soap is added along with warm water and shaken in the bottle.

If you're ridiculously paranoid, however, add half a capful of bleach and a tsp of liquid dish soap with hot water, cap, shake, and let sit overnight.

As for the "bottles," I just reuse my "wide mouth" soda bottles from the store. They're cheap (already paid for) and polycarbonate (nearly indestructible).

Why pay?


I didn't realize this, but bottles are different all over the world. the plastic bottles in Germany are the thickest material I've ever seen.



Of course they reuse them at the factory ;)

[Tobin Dax]

why refill something you've already used the one time?

Since I'm not sure of how I should read this, let me clarify my post: "a time" is "a while," not "one time." I use them a number of times, but change bottles every so often.

[crosscountry]

ok . I read that wrong.

[Fazor]

Next thing you know, they'll be putting instructions on toothpicks...

Good Idea: Using a toothpick to remove food stuck between your teeth.
Bad Idea: Using a toothipick to remove a spec of dirt from your eye.

This has been another Good Idea, Bad Idea.

[Damien Evans]

Next thing you know, they'll be putting instructions on toothpicks...

When that happens, can I join you outside the assylum?

[Noclevername]

When that happens, can I join you outside the assylum?

Sure, pull up a lawn chair. :lol:

[Doodler]

Bottled water is tap water, distilled to straight H2O, then "flavored" with a mineral package that basically amounts to dirt (that is a verbatim description by a representative of their corporation's facilities development manager) to simulate the flavor you theoretically would get from drinking water that actually eroded rocks.

I ain't sayin' what company or product, but its one of the big ones in the US.

[Gillianren]

Good Idea: Using a toothpick to remove food stuck between your teeth.
Bad Idea: Using a toothipick to remove a spec of dirt from your eye.

This has been another Good Idea, Bad Idea.

Oh, I love those!

Some bottled water, Doodler, received no treatment at the plant at all. (Personally, I wash my water bottle--I'm going to replace it, but because the cap's lousy--and refill it from my filtered faucet.)

[Doodler]

I can only speak for the one company, since I got to see so much of their inner workings on the project I did for them.