Health through natural water
Your skin is the largest organ of your body. Protect it.
With science proving the vital importance of the human *microbiome to health and wellbeing, people are looking far more closely at what goes into and onto their body.
*microbiome: - the microorganisms in a particular environment (including the body or a part of the body).
"we depend on a vast army of microbes to stay alive: a microbiome protects us against germs, breaks down food to release energy, and produces vitamins"
The ‘Wellness Paradox’ and Chlorine Swimming Pools
The swimming pool and spa industry is often referred to as the wellness industry but most swimming pools use chemical reliant sanitisation systems that attack your body as they oxidize bacteria or algae.
The team at Origin Aqua believe this is a contradiction in terms. We developed the mineral+biome® system to say farewell to the use of chlorine in private swimming pools and improve your health.
+ Read More About Chlorine & the Wellness Paradox
Too much chlorine is not good for you. Why use it when there is a natural alternative?
When chlorine oxidizes organic matter (or inorganic matter from care products) it creates disinfectant-by-products (DBP’s) - in particular Trihalomethanes, Haloacetic acids and Chloramines. These attack your hair, skin, eyes and lungs and are responsible for the strong smell around certain pools rather than the disinfectant itself.
Trihalomethanes (THM’s) boost your risk of bladder cancer and have been linked with colon cancer, asthma, irritation of the eyes and mucus membrane.
Haloacetic acids (HAA’s) and chloramines strip hair and skin of their natural oils, destroy polyunsaturated fatty acids and vitamin E, attack your eyes and lungs and diminish the microflora in your skin and gut. This lowers your immunity, aggravates existing skin conditions like acne, psoriasis and seborrhoea, and leaves you susceptible to eczema, asthma, allergies and yeast infections such as candida. In indoor pools it can lead to granulomatous pneumonitis, a persistent cough known as lifeguard lung.
The Origin Aqua system means none of these detrimental substances are present in your pool.
Skin Absorption
Our skin’s protective layer contains billions of beneficial bacteria, thousands of viruses and a plethora of fungi that act as our body’s gatekeepers.
When we bathe, we absorb water into our skin and latent chemicals make their way into our bodies through a process called dermal absorption. Our skin’s protective layer contains billions of beneficial bacteria, thousands of viruses and a plethora of fungi that act as our body’s gatekeepers. Collectively, these microorganisms are known as your skin’s microflora, or microbiome and are our primary interface with the outside environment.
Swimming pool chemicals directly affect the microbiome constituents, diminishing our skin’s protective barrier and lowering its immunity. Origin Aqua’s non-use of disinfection chemicals is an easy choice to make; its living water helps strengthen your skin’s protective barrier and preserves your health.
+ Read more - Your Microbiome
The Microbiome
The human microbiome is a term more and more frequently found in the health, wellness and skincare industry. It refers to bacteria, fungi and viruses that live throughout your body, including 2kg in your gut and the billions of microbes in your second largest organ (by surface area), your skin (the ‘brain-gut-skin axis’).
The world’s understanding of these biomes has exploded since the introduction of bacteria DNA gene sequencing in the early 2000s. Hygiene and disinfectant use (including chlorine) have led to some significant advancements but have brought their own problems. Society’s obsession with hygiene has led to evolutionary changes in our brain-gut-skin axis, which many believe is linked to the rapidly growing cases of allergies and autoimmune conditions around the world.
Causal links between the brain-gut-skin axis mean emotions can affect your skin. In the same way disinfectants such as chlorine can create imbalances in your microbiome leading to diseases like candida which can cause depression and anxiety.
Increasingly and emphatically research suggests that the more diverse your microflora are, the easier it is for your good bacteria to protect you from infections. For instance, people with eczema, acne and rosacea, have been found to have less diverse microbiomes.
Whilst skincare companies are now starting to invest billions in products to work in harmony with your microbiome, Origin Aqua has been nurturing microbiomes since 2013!
Oral Ingestion
Your mouth is regulated by its own microbiome.
If you’re in a pool, the chances are you swallow water. Indeed, a 2017 study found that, on average, swimmers will ingest 32ml of water per hour of bathing, but that this can be up to 4x more for children.
It not only tastes bad, but there are more and more recognised health consequences. Our mineral water is optimised for absorption and oral contact, it typically contains less than 300 ppm total dissolved solids (TDS) and this low figure means it is categorized as ‘excellent’ water by the WHO (Evian contains 330 ppm TDS!).
+ Read More About Chlorine and Oral Health
Your mouth is regulated by its own microbiome, a semipermeable membrane that performs important functions such as eliminating free radicals, remineralizing your teeth and transporting oxygen to the gums and soft tissue. Daily exposure to chlorinated water can cause teeth staining, dental erosion and increased calculus formation known as ‘swimmer’s mouth’.
Pregnancy and early life
Microbes are important for immunomodulatory responses during pregnancy and early life when immune pathways are established. By using oxidation and ionisation, traditional pool sanitation can damage your skin’s protective barrier and leave you more vulnerable to inflammatory conditions such as eczema, asthma and allergies.
+ Read more - Nature relatedness & The Hygiene Hypothesis
Plants, soils, pets, water, food and the surrounding air all contain microbes and microbial biodiversity is key to the human biome. Whilst allergies, eczema, asthma and autoimmune conditions are a product of both genetics and our microbiomes. Their increase has been linked to the erosion of biodiversity in our external shared environment and commensal bacteria in our microbiome, as well as our reduced contact with nature through modern living.
Living Water
At Origin Aqua we believe in utilising non-harmful residual microbes over disinfectants like chlorine.
The microbial loop at the heart of the mineral+biome® system has taken nature 3.3 billion years to evolve and Origin Aqua nearly a decade to perfect.
Because Origin Aqua uses natural microbes to bio-digest organic (and inorganic) material instead of oxidizing it, there are no toxic by-products and no damage to your body’s cells or microbiome.
+ Read More About Our Microbes
At Origin Aqua we believe in utilising non-harmful residual microbes over disinfectants like chlorine.
In the same way that contact with microbes from soil improves your health, our water contains a host of non-pathogenic microbes such as actinobacteria, ammonia oxidizing bacteria and saprophytic microorganisms that can act as commensal bacteria for your microbiome. This strengthens your skin’s barrier and immunity.
If ever there was a need to stop using chemicals in pools, it is down to the importance of looking after your microbiome,
Our Mineraliser Technology
The benefits of zinc, selenium and magnesium.
Origin Aqua’s mineraliser utilises elements including zinc, selenium and magnesium to induce the natural spa like quality of its living water.
The mineral content is optimised for your health and skin, and this combined with the absence of disinfection chemicals and salts translates into noticeably clearer water.
The mineraliser works in tandem with our other proprietary technology to ensure our leading position in the natural pool market.
+ Read more about our minerals
Our residual minerals include calcium, zinc, magnesium and selenium at levels optimised for oral and skin contact.
Calcium, found in most European water, is the building block of your bones and teeth and essential for blood clotting and muscle contraction.
Zinc halts ageing, increases wound healing and provides all round protection for skin including UVA and UVB protection. In addition, it dries excess oil and revives your glow by tightening the skin.
Magnesium leads to higher moisture retention, reduced inflammation and improved skin barrier, and is particularly effective for those with atopic dermatitis.
Selenium has anti-inflammatory properties, mitigates lipid peroxidation, and protects against UV-B induced skin damage. Research has shown that it is a pre-biotic for your skin’s microflora, leading to increased levels of the good bacteria Xanthomonas (and to a lesser degree Corynebacterium genus) and reduced levels of Staphylococcus aureus. This improves both eczema and psoriasis.
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Get your questions answered
Please feel free to contact us and ask any questions. We’d love to hear from you.