If you have a water softener installed in your home, the likelihood is that your water supply will be used for all your everyday use – including as drinking water.
There’s nothing to suggest that glugging it down is harmful for you. Nevertheless, it’s worth bearing in mind how water is softened, which can be a bit off putting for some people.
Creating soft water involves the removal of hard water minerals, such as magnesium and calcium. These minerals are replaced with sodium ions, which do add to the water’s salt content. Soft water contains approximately about 45 milligrams per litre of salts. This is well within acceptable guidelines.
The level of sodium contained in soft water is of no real concern to most people but, if you suffer from high blood pressure or have specific dietary requirements, it may be best to avoid drinking soft water.
Does soft water affect the taste of drinking water?
Some people prefer the slightly salty taste of soft water – especially if they’ve been used to hard water that has that unpleasant chlorine flavour toit. However, although the slight tang of salt in soft water is quite normal, it isn’t to everyone’s liking. So, yes, soft water can slightly alter the taste.
What should I do if I don’t want to drink soft water?
For many people, having a water softener is a godsend, providing a range of health and lifestyle benefits that wouldn’t be possible living with hard water in the home.
As much as soft water is great for cleaning, washing and cooking, it isn’t universally liked for drinking – however that needn’t be a problem.
For minimal additional expense, you can install a drinking water filter utilising a reverse osmosis (RO) water purification system. This ensures the water is not only of the purest quality, it can also be remineralised which can make the water more palatable for drinking.
Conclusion
Whilst soft water is perfectly safe to drink, due to the extra sodium that it contains, it is best avoided for those who suffer from high blood pressure, The amount of sodium is sufficiently low that it makes no difference to the majority of people.
Although water softeners are designed to remove hard water minerals, like calcium and magnesium, if you prefer to drink water containing them, they can be reintroduced through a remineralisation filter.
Soft water is safe, clean, free from scaling – and perfectly drinkable. Raise a glass to soft water!
Order MolliVita water softeners and water filters online. If you want to speak to one of our friendly team, please feel free to call us on 01243 252360 or contact us by email: hello@mollivita.co.uk
(Please note that all prices listed below and throughout the MolliVita website are inclusive of VAT).