11 replies to this topic

[Daylen]

Since I've been swimming for a while, I'm really worried about the risks of chlorine. Damage to the hair and skin if often mentioned, but that's not what worries me. Some studies mention a potential cancer risk. Just as an example: http://news.discover...ing-cancer.html (they only found a rise in blood markers associated with cancer, but still).

Anyhow, this must be the most health conscious forum in the internet, so there's got to be some swimmer here who knows about this. Do the benefits of swimming outweigh the risks? Since physical inactivity is obviously not a good choice, I'm also interested in comparing it to other forms of cardio such as running or cycling.

I really don't want to stop swimming (it's the only kind of exercise I find fun, other than tennis), but if the risks are serious I might consider it. My plan is to eventually own a house with a swimming pool without chlorine, but that will take a long while (I'm currently 18 years old and in university).

Is it possible the risks are only relevant to competitive swimmers, and not casual swimmers who only swim 5-10 hours a week?

By the way, this is my first post. I'm interested in many things other than this (you'll probably see me in the nutrition forum eventually), but this is what is worrying me recently. So if anyone can give me any info on how safe swimming in a chlorinated pool really is, I'll appreciate it.

[dz93]

Do you have city water? If so you could be exposed to more levels of chlorine than just swimming alone. I have city water and when I showered I could smell the chlorine vapors very easily , my hair and skin suffered. Then about 4 days ago I ordered a shower head purifier and have been noticing great results. But yes chlorine is known to cause cancer. It really just depends on the levels you're exposed to so just try to limit it as much as possible.

[Strelok]

I've read that chlorine from pool water, if absorbed (which I'm sure it is, just not sure how much) will displace iodine in the body since they're both halogens. For this reason, I very rarely go into chlorinated pools or hot tubs, and use a chlorine (etc.) filter on my shower head.

[niner]

I don't know of any solid evidence that swimming puts you at risk from the chlorine. The studies linked above were pretty sketchy- they didn't control for exertion, for example. There should have been controls who swam for the same amount of time in a non-chlorinated pool, for example. The finding of a bunch of toxic compounds in pool water is meaningless if the dose is insanely small. Modern analytical methodology can find a part per trillion of everything in everything, but that doesn't mean it's harmful. There might be some risk from being in the water a lot, like "swimmer's ear". It would probably be marginally better to swim in a lake or river, as long as you weren't harmed by one of the numerous risks found in nature. As they said in the article, swimming is still better for you than not swimming, unless you have some sort of great alternative exercise.

A shower filter is ok if you want to spend the money on it, but you're exposing yourself to much larger risks if bugs grow in your shower head and you wind up with a very hard-to-treat mycobacterial pneumonia. You'd better plan on changing the filter cartridge a lot; The ones I've seen are pretty small, and aren't likely to work for long. Personally, I'm sticking with tap water. You could try taking a bath, and adding some sodium thiosulfate to it. That's used to de-chlorinate tap water for aquariums. It turns it into chloride ion, which is harmless.

[Arjiuna]

Chlorine vapors that reach to about 6 inches above the surface of the water also cause asthma in children. 

[gt35r]

Chlorine won't displace iodine or iodide. If chloride/chlorine displaced iodide then we would be in trouble considering a substantial amount of out blood plasma is essentially saline water. 

[niner]

Chlorine won't displace iodine or iodide. If chloride/chlorine displaced iodide then we would be in trouble considering a substantial amount of out blood plasma is essentially saline water. 

 

Chloride won't displace iodine, but in a test tube, chlorine can oxidize iodide back to iodine.  In the body, the chlorine would probably steal an electron from something else before it encountered iodide.  Even if iodide were oxidized by chlorine, it would just get reduced by something else.  Enough free chlorine can wreak a lot of havoc on an organism.  That's why it was used as one of the earliest chemical warfare agents and is put into drinking water and swimming pools - to kill microorganisms.   But the damage that chlorine does to organisms is rampant oxidation.  I don't think that iodine has much to do with it.

[Danae]

There was a documentary on the BBC a few years ago about Britain's centenarians. Many swam regularly. There was one lady of 108 who went swimming every single morning at her local pool. She walked there, and did her shopping on the way back. She was a completely normal interviewee, no sign of any mental deterioration. She had been a regular pool user all her life.

That's good enough for me.

[JohnD60]

There was a documentary on the BBC a few years ago about Britain's centenarians. Many swam regularly. There was one lady of 108 who went swimming every single morning at her local pool. She walked there, and did her shopping on the way back. She was a completely normal interviewee, no sign of any mental deterioration. She had been a regular pool user all her life.

That's good enough for me.

 

Was it fresh water or salt water? Was it an indoor or outdoor pool? How was it treated, Ozone, Bromine, Chlorine, something else, or some combination? That is not good enough for me, I will avoid swimming in indoor pools, especially those treated with Chlorine. When I say swimming I mean doing laps.
 

Edited by JohnD60, 19 September 2014 - 06:30 PM.

[Andey]

 

There was a documentary on the BBC a few years ago about Britain's centenarians. Many swam regularly. There was one lady of 108 who went swimming every single morning at her local pool. She walked there, and did her shopping on the way back. She was a completely normal interviewee, no sign of any mental deterioration. She had been a regular pool user all her life.

That's good enough for me.

 

Was it fresh water or salt water? Was it an indoor or outdoor pool? How was it treated, Ozone, Bromine, Chlorine, something else, or some combination? That is not good enough for me, I will avoid swimming in indoor pools, especially those treated with Chlorine. When I say swimming I mean doing laps.
 

 

 

  Common sense says that it was indoor choline treated pool. Indoor because it is Britain, famous for its unpredictable weather and rather cold one. Chlorine because lady is 108 years old, majority of her swimming sessions went on 60-90-ties with no other treating options available.

  Personally I also prefer to stay away from chlorine pools, coz my skin feels little bit irritated after it. Very similar to irritation from sun exposure.

[Destiny's Equation]

Are these studies any good?

http://www.spectrali...hemical-studies

Also I read a study that showed that competitive swimmers have lungs as porous as the lungs of heavy smokers, has anyone else read that one?

(I suspect that my reactive airway disease was caused by swimming in chlorinated pools a lot as a child and teenager.)

[niner]

Are these studies any good?

http://www.spectrali...hemical-studies

Also I read a study that showed that competitive swimmers have lungs as porous as the lungs of heavy smokers, has anyone else read that one?

(I suspect that my reactive airway disease was caused by swimming in chlorinated pools a lot as a child and teenager.)

 

They're ok studies, not the greatest, but ok.  The company that runs the web site sells UV sanitizing systems that allow you to use less chlorine.  It's in their interest to make the studies sound as scary as possible while still making them sound believable.   They do a pretty good job of that.   I don't think there's any question that overly chlorinated water is bad, particularly when a lot of organic pollutants are present.  The more important question is what's the danger of the typical municipal water supply or typical pool?  Some pools use too much chlorine.  If you combine that with bad air pollution or dirty water, you have a recipe for trouble.  Even without those things, too much chlorine is too much.   The point of chlorine is to kill bacteria that might make you sick or kill you.  You have to strike a balance between the risk of microbes and the risk from excess chlorine.  I think that a lot of pool owners err on the side of killing bacteria, and ignore the danger of the chemicals they're putting in the water.  If I had a pool, I'd look into one of the UV systems.  No telling what weird chemicals are formed from UV exposure, though...  Today I was in a local river.  No chlorine, but there was a very scary-looking water snake not far from where I was standing.  Gotta pick your poison, I guess.