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submitted 5 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago) by otter@lemmy.ca to c/comicstrips@lemmy.world
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[-] ImplyingImplications@lemmy.ca 86 points 5 days ago

My brother had a kid and I always feel like some out of touch old man when we talk about it. Once he told me todlers can only have distilled water and I had to stop myself from going "Back in my day, my parents gave me tap water and I turned out fine!"

[-] 9point6@lemmy.world 117 points 5 days ago

I thought distilled water was bad for humans to consume as it leeches nutrients from you?

[-] PyroNeurosis 19 points 4 days ago

That'd be deionized water, I think...

[-] zout@fedia.io 74 points 4 days ago

Nope, distilled water has nothing, no minerals or anything else, including ions. Deionized water is also not the best for consumption.

[-] SchmidtGenetics@lemmy.world 16 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

But distilled is perfectly safe to drink… it just tastes weird from the lack of minerals and other stuff.

[-] zout@fedia.io 50 points 4 days ago

For once, yes. But exclusively? It'll extract minerals from your body, causing health issues.

[-] SchmidtGenetics@lemmy.world 11 points 4 days ago
[-] IrateAnteater@sh.itjust.works 32 points 4 days ago
[-] SchmidtGenetics@lemmy.world 16 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

It doesn’t strip minerals, it just doesn’t replace them, eat enough salty foods and it’s a non issue. Distilled isn’t stripping stuff, it just doesn’t replenish it.

So your source is what…? Some smart ass comment that you don’t even comprehend yourself? Provide an actual source if you think that’s what is the issue.

[-] zout@fedia.io 8 points 4 days ago

Source for the salty foods? Salt in food is normally sodium chloride, not the calcium or magnesium which you need to replenish.

[-] SchmidtGenetics@lemmy.world 7 points 4 days ago

You don’t drink milk or take a multivitamin, veggies, fruits? There’s lots of sources, it doesn’t strip, so you don’t need to eat extra.

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[-] brucethemoose@lemmy.world 13 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

Pretty sure that’s not how it works. Water is mixed with a soup of stuff the moment it goes in your body, and our digestive system/diet is not as simple as osmotic pressure pushing water into cells (and somehow pushing other substances out?) if that’s what you’re getting at.

[-] zout@fedia.io 6 points 4 days ago

Can't find it right now, lots of articles online about electrolyte imbalance causing issues, but none linked to an actual source.

[-] SchmidtGenetics@lemmy.world 7 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

Yeah there’s a reason for that… distilled doesn’t strip, so there won’t be any source that corroborates that statement.

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[-] psud@aussie.zone 6 points 4 days ago

Tap water doesn't exactly have loads of electrolytes. I think though the normal advice is to give small children boiled water to protect them from water borne illnesses

It's probably more important in places with less safe water

[-] ricecake@sh.itjust.works 2 points 3 days ago

Yeah, it's to protect them from disease. In almost all circumstances a place with tap water from a municipal source is fine.

Premature infants might be advised to only get sterile water for a bit as an extra precaution, and people might also hold off a little longer on well water.

[-] painfulasterisk1@lemmy.ml 7 points 4 days ago

I thought that it was deionized water, not distilled water that strips your body from minerals

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[-] jol@discuss.tchncs.de 48 points 5 days ago

What. That can't be true. Maybe there's some advantage, like less fluoride etc. But it's not true they can't drink rap water...

[-] Chainweasel@lemmy.world 38 points 5 days ago

Maybe they live in Flint Michigan 🤷‍♂️

[-] jol@discuss.tchncs.de 31 points 5 days ago

Well, sure, not all tap water is potable for adults either. But giving special water to toddlers sounds like overzealous parenting. I rather give tap water, which is totally safe here, than water from a plastic bottle.

[-] Chainweasel@lemmy.world 7 points 5 days ago

I was just being facetious lol.

[-] General_Effort@lemmy.world 5 points 4 days ago

Not everything that is safe for adults is safe for little ones. Honey, for example, has to be boiled.

[-] phdepressed@sh.itjust.works 13 points 4 days ago

While boiling should work the medical recommendation is no honey at all until 1y.

[-] Quokka@quokk.au 41 points 5 days ago

Babies, babies can't have tap water.

~6 months you start with cooled boiled water.

~12 months you can move onto tap water.

[-] rijom@lemmy.ml 37 points 4 days ago

That also depends on where you live and on the quality of the tap water. Doctor here now recommend you to use tap water also for formula - without boiling it first.

[-] tetris11@lemmy.ml 10 points 4 days ago

wait, how did babies back in the day (~1000s years ago) survive?

[-] Absolute_Axoltl@feddit.uk 59 points 4 days ago
[-] Sylvartas@lemmy.dbzer0.com 32 points 4 days ago

By and large, they didn't

[-] Initiateofthevoid@lemmy.dbzer0.com 7 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

This species has been around for 250,000 years; for 249,800 of those years, about half of children died before the age of 5.

About half of all children died as children. Which of course means half of all humans who have ever lived, died as children.

(The source is really John Green's book, Everything is Tuberculosis, this is just an interview with the author where he quotes that.)

[-] usualsuspect191@lemmy.ca 10 points 4 days ago
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[-] OhNoMoreLemmy@lemmy.ml 9 points 4 days ago

Across Europe there's different recommendations in every country, and no evidence of different illness/mortality rates related to the recommendation.

France says tap water is safe for all ages.

If you're in the US, I totally get why you might want to keep boiling your water, but remember that boiling doesn't remove lead.

[-] ricecake@sh.itjust.works 2 points 3 days ago

The US has a water system effectively comparable to the ones across Europe, FYI. That includes lead levels, since it wasn't just the US that used lead pipes.

In most circumstances lead pipes are safe to replace with different materials as part of routine maintenance. It's only very notable incidents where things go wrong that have driven a push for greater haste, since it highlighted the consequences of things going wrong.

[-] RickyRigatoni@retrolemmy.com 4 points 4 days ago

Make baby drink boiling water so they're cool. Got it.

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this post was submitted on 12 Jun 2025
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