This is a bike from 1991.
There are several different types of humidifiers. The most popular are ultrasonic ones. They eat little energy and are efficient and quiet. And cheap. Such humidifiers were invented by the Japanese back in the seventies of the last century. Nearly perfect moisturizers.
Only for some reason the Japanese were the first to abandon them.
It's all about "white dust". From the ultrasonic humidifier, objects in the rooms are covered with a layer of salt.
If humidifiers of other types simply evaporate water, then ultrasonic ones crush it. That is, it is not humid air or steam that escapes from the ultrasonic humidifier, but microscopic drops of cold water. There are, of course, heated ultrasonic humidifiers, but this does not change the essence. That is, droplets of water are crushed into the air, which fly around the house and gradually evaporate. This increases the humidity.
It's all about the water. If the water was not distilled, then hardness salts will fly into the air, which must be in the water supply system. It turns out that water flies out of the ultrasonic humidifier along with all the debris floating in it. Then the water evaporates, and the debris continues to fly and flies into our lungs.
First, let's talk about "white dust".
White dust
It's just salt. Nobody knows exactly how bad it is to breathe this thing. The Americans have a so-called Environmental Control Agency. It regulates air quality, indoor microclimate and other ecology.
And this agency at one time developed standards for humidifiers. They studied everything there, decided that there was no big harm from "white dust", but it is advisable to pour demineralized water into the ultrasonic humidifiers. There are almost no salts in such water, so there is nothing to settle on furniture in the form of white dust.
Demineralized water is taken from properly functioning reverse osmotic household filters. Well, or bring home from work with bottles from under the cooler. I have such an acquaintance. Works with an industrial distiller and still has the physical strength to bring water home.
Everything seems to be neat, decorous and noble. Do you know when was the last time that same American agency revised its recommendations for ultrasonic humidifiers? Already in 1991 (one thousand nine hundred and ninety-first) year.
I don’t understand this. Since then, so much has changed that the information is clearly outdated. Many medical topics that were relevant in the early nineties, then turned out to be refuted a couple of times in different directions.
Remember the early nineties fashion for cholesterol-friendly margarines? Then it suddenly turned out that these spreads with trans fats were more harmful than lard. So with the "white dust" something could happen that would make you and me refuse to buy an ultrasonic humidifier.
But the regulators are not publishing anything new. Information about the harm is slowly accumulating, but the documents remain old.
Already after 1991, there was evidence of the dangers of white dust, which can cause pneumonia in children.
Disease of ultrasonic fountains
There really is such a disease. It looks like pneumonia, but it doesn't start from living germs, but from the debris of dead bacteria that fly out of the ultrasonic humidifier.
Well, that is, you and I understand that an infection can multiply in a humidifier, and mucus will appear. The trick is that even if we kill these microbes with bleach or boiling water, their debris will still hang in the water and ultrasonic technology will spray them into the air.
If we breathe in the debris of dead microbes, then our lungs will react to them as if they were alive.
Well, that is, pneumonia is, roughly speaking, inflammation that permeates the lungs. Our immunity reacts to microbial debris in much the same way as it does to living ones.
It's like a dead bacterial vaccine in your shoulder. The vaccination site hurts, and the shoulder swells and turns red. But if the lung swells and turns red, then there will be pneumonia - inflammation of the lungs.
And the most interesting thing is that it is not clear what to do with such inflammation. Because the germs were already dead.
