which water is best for your health?

Is bottled water better for our health?

In 2022, the bottled water market was worth £2.07 billion, with Highland Spring water the most frequently selected brand.

There are three distinct types of water that may be ‘bottled’ as identified by Defra (the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs): natural mineral water, spring water and bottled drinking water. Regulation is the responsibility of local authorities where the water is sourced. 

If the bottled water is from outside the UK it must be compliant with the compositional and safety standards of the country of destination. Natural mineral water from outside the UK, cannot be marketed as such unless it is recognised by the relevant UK authority; Defra, Food Standards Scotland and Food Standards Agency in Wales. 

Mineral water

This is water that has filtered down through rocks, purifying it and adding minerals naturally, which is then taken directly from deep underground by boreholes drilled far into the ground and bottled at source; it certainly sounds healthier and tastier than London’s much recycled tap water. 

However, despite the perception that mineral water is pristine and uncontaminated, Dr Lloyd says: “It is likely that the science is just not there at the moment to confirm if there is contamination of mineral waters with PFAS.”

To meet requirements of the definition, all UK mineral water must contain consistent mineral composition including calcium, magnesium, potassium and sulphates and use only five permitted treatments to improve the water: filtration or decanting; removal of free carbon dioxide; adding carbon dioxide to produce sparkling natural mineral water; ozone-enriched air oxidation to separate compounds of iron, manganese, sulphur and arsenic from water when they occur naturally at source; and activated alumina to remove fluoride.

It takes two years to be officially recognised as mineral water through a local authority, during which time it is repeatedly analysed.

“They will be continually testing their source to make sure nothing is getting into that ground water source, and there will be a list of things they have to look for. But if it’s not on the list it won’t be tested for because it is expensive to test,” says Dr Lloyd.  

Her work looking at river pollution hasn’t convinced her that springs are guaranteed to be contaminate-free. 

“What we see from river water is that there are chemicals that are human derived in every river, even in the most pristine stream we still find plastic chemicals. When you think about groundwater, where a lot of spring water will come from, there’s no guarantee that those springs are any cleaner than our processed water. Of course there are regulations and they have to be tested but I wouldn’t say they are any cleaner or any better.”

In the United States, a 2020 study by Consumer Reports found toxic PFAS chemicals in several popular water brands, especially carbonated ones.

Finding true mineral water is difficult in our polluted world. “The best water is probably buried in Antarctica, stuff that’s been locked away for thousands of years where we’ve not had a chance to contaminate it,” says Dr Megson. “And the last thing I would recommend is going there, digging up the ice and using it for our drinking water.”

Spring water

Similar to mineral water, the term spring is used to refer to water collected directly from a natural source, typically far underground in natural aquifers where the spring water rises to the surface. Unlike natural mineral water, there is no formal recognition process required for spring water, although it must still be registered with the local authority.

Many natural mineral waters begin their lives as spring waters trading as such during the two year testing period. Unlike natural mineral waters, spring waters may undergo permitted treatments.

Bottled water

A bottle of water that is labelled neither as spring or natural mineral water is called table water. Table water may come from more than one source and may include the public water supply.  In 2004 Coca-Cola faced ridicule after its Dasani branded bottled water was revealed as being treated tap water from Sidcup, Kent. It was after a batch was contaminated with levels of bromate, a suspected human carcinogen that the brand was withdrawn from the market.

Bottled water can be treated to meet the compositional and microbiological requirements of the regulations.