Comments on: What's the story with Aqua Mira Water Treatment drops?

Question: What's the story with Aqua Mira Water Treatment drops?

wavejumper — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 08:27:09 -0800

Questions about Aqua Mira chlorine water treatment drops, the kind that comes in two different droppers: I notice it is now marketed to say: "Kills Odor Causing Bacteria and Enhances the Taste..." etc. Not to kill giardia and make water actually safe to drink. Which is what backpackers actually use it for. Anyone know the inside legal story on this? Second question: Why do I always run out of "Part A" way before I run out of "Part B"? Does anyone out there work for Aqua Mira and know why they give you different amounts? It's annoying because now I have all these Part B (the Activator) droppers lying around.

I've been using this water treatment for a year or two when I go backpacking (a lot of people use it on the Appalachian Trail), and have never gotten sick from water with it, but still...just wondering if it's actually proven to be safe and if so why they don't advertise that.

By: bcwinters

bcwinters — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 12:06:48 -0800

Chlorine dioxide does have a public health statement about its dangers but it's an accepted way to treat municipal water in the US and is almost certainly the best for emergency use in areas away from clean water.

The only Aqua Mira bottles I've ever seen were each one ounce, and you used the same number of drops out of each bottle to activate the mixture. They should therefore generally run out at the same time.

I'm not sure what you mean about the company avoiding mentioning making "water actually safe to drink." All the documentation about Aqua Mira still talks about maintaining safety in long-term water storage, water safety while hiking, killing giardia and cryptosporwhatchamacallit, etc—I imagine they've added verbiage about "enhancing taste" to their blisterpacks because they're tapping into the bottled water/water filtration "lifestyle" craze which probably opens up a whole new market for them.

By: ssg

ssg — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 14:03:05 -0800

This (pdf) probably covers what you want to know. Nothing is absolutely safe, but as you can see chlorine dioxide at these concentrations is pretty effective, though not against cryptosporidium.

By: SampleSize

SampleSize — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 08:40:13 -0800

A bit off-topic, but I used Aqua Mira until I discovered KlearWater. It's the same stuff, but already mixed and you don't have to wait for it to react before putting it the water.