Drink More Water by George Thomas Palmer

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Washington, D.C. · Nov 26, 1903

Drink More Water

By George Thomas Palmer

THE health department of the city of Chicago — in which the water supply was far in excess of the demand — found that when this water was used sparingly, the water-borne diseases increased, and that when the excess of water was allowed to escape into the sewers, the health of the city was greatly improved. The reason for this is that the refuse and disease-producing filth constantly accumulating in the sewers is washed away when the excess of water is allowed to flow therein.

The human body contains a complete sewerage system in which poisonous and disease-producing refuse is constantly gathering and jeopardizing the health. The same rule that applies to municipal sanitation will also apply to personal sanitation, and the danger of disease may be forestalled by flushing out this sewerage system with an excess of water. Just as truly as the gathering of filth from the city in the “sewerage veins” it is endangers the lives of the inhabitants, so the poisons generated by the bodily metabolism, collected in the excretory organs, will jeopardize the living cells. Every action of muscle or of nerve is accompanied by the destruction of cells, which, if not eliminated, will accumulate like clinkers in a furnace, preventing the proper performance of function. The food is taken in like fuel for the furnace, is burned, and leaves its clinkers and ashes behind, and these products of combustion in the body will choke the fire, just as in the ordinary stove.

Aside from the mere “choking of the flues,” we must bear in mind that the body is constantly generating poisons, which, if eliminated freely, will do no harm; but which, if retained, will be productive of disease. Such a poison is uric acid, which is charged justly with causing rheumatism, gout, constant headache, dizziness, and a train of other symptoms; and it must be seen that if the accumulation of refuse is the cause of such conditions, the logical means of cure is its elimination. Other “products of metabolism” create their own types of disease, and all may be prevented by the free use of water.

While we may prevent these diseases of internal origin by flushing out the products of normal digestion (poisons which in themselves are disease-producing), there is another way, just as important, but less direct, by which internal cleanliness keeps us in health. Each organ of the body, and the body as a whole, has a certain property which we call “natural immunity,” the power of antagonism to disease. This power is not unlimited, but is capable of the destruction of thousands of bacteria which invade our bodies daily from without. In this labor, however, our power of immunity is kept quite busy, and any additional drain upon it prevents its attention to its normal business. These poisons generated within can be destroyed largely by this immunizing power, but in so doing much of the power is exhausted, and we are left largely unprotected from diseases from without. In this we are able to see that the retention of refuse in the body is often the forerunner of any sort of disease; and, conversely, we can understand that the man who “keeps himself clean within” by frequent internal washing will, under ordinary circumstances, avoid the general run of diseases.

So the liberal use of pure water, by washing out the refuse and economizing in the bodily immunity, will prevent disease, and it will also act as a health saver, because in its purity it brings into the body none of those diseases which medical men know as “water borne.”

We must remember, furthermore, that water is a food, making up two thirds of the body weight, and it is far more important than any other form of food, for we may live without eating for weeks, while we can live without drinking only for a few days. In the form of blood it is water which carries the food to every part of the body; in the form of lymph it is water which carries away the poisons for excretion; in the form of blood water carries the heat to all parts of the body, as does the hot-water system in the heating of a house; and in the form of sweat it is water which evaporates from the skin, and reduces the body temperature. It is water which acts as the lubricant that permits the joints to act without friction, the lungs to slide freely in their action, the heart to glide in the pericardium, the food to be swallowed without difficulty and to move through the intestinal tract in the process of digestion; and it is water that holds the digestive ferments in solution, and permits them to come in contact with the food. These vital functions are performed in direct ratio to the amount of water taken. As the water supply is reduced, each and every function is correspondingly crippled, until, when the supply is shut off entirely, the various organs simultaneously continue their decline toward death.

We feel that a clean skin is a necessity to our claims of higher civilization. If it is essential to keep the skin clean, how much more important is it to wash regularly and thoroughly the vastly more important eliminative organs “on the inside.” Their work is far more important, and they are far more essential to health.—George Thomas Palmer, M. D., in Good Housekeeping.