* Modern environments, such as your well-sealed house, high-rise buildings and automobiles, have few if any negative ions in the atmosphere. The have all dumped their free-loading electrons on the metal ventilating ducts, synthetic drapes, synthetic rugs, and the metal shell of the car. Metal and modern plastics and synthetics eat free electrons.
* Your well-sealed modern house lacks negative ions to depollute the sir, kill airborne germs, and supply your body with free electrons.
* Everyone in Calgary knows that a Chinook raises the suicide rate, the crime rate, and the automobile accident rate. Do they also know that the front end of a Chinook blows in an electrical environment with almost no negative ions in the air? The Canadian Chinook is one of the milder "witch's winds" that blow around the world -- all statistically wreaking psychological havoc.
* Electrical storm fronts lack negative ions -- they are positively charged. Animals and humans alike are agitated with the arrival of a storm yet feel invigorated after it passes. The reason? The rear end of that storm is negatively charged and deposits massive doses of negative ions in the air.
* The Montreal General Hospital is cautiously testing negative ion generators for purifying operating room atmospheres -- with very encouraging early results. The units have been used for years in burn wards through Europe and Japan to prevent infection and speed healing of open wounds.
* Truck drivers in Europe use negative ion generators to stay alert. Some companies require their use because of their proven capacity to reduce the accident rate.
* The Canadian National Railway headquarters in Montreal are full of negative ion generators.
* Submarines won't go down without them and astronauts won't go up without them.
* I know asthmatics who won't live without negative ion generators. (I also know people who are completely insensitive to negative ions and don't believe a word I say.)
Which leads to one of the major reasons for scepticism about this whole idea. Research out of the United States shows that people react to ion changes, (both negative and positive ions) very differently. Here's what researchers have found.
* Five per cent of the population are "acute" -- very sensitive to ion depletion or positive ion-rich environments. These people dislike air conditioning, are irritated by tobacco smoke, are highly reactive to approaching storms, and become agitated or short of breath in stuffy rooms.
* Twenty per cent of the population are "clinical" -- they react symptomatically to moderate changes in ion environment. There is some delay in the onset of symptoms, which are often observable by others either directly or as modified behavior.
* Half of the population is "subclinical" -- symptoms are chiefly subjective and noticed only with substantial changes in the ion environment.
* Twenty per cent of the population is "resistive" -- they rarely exhibit reactions, but may feel faint discomfort with gross ion depletion or under stress.
* Five per cent of the population is "immune" -- apparently impervious to subjective symptoms, their metabolism is affected by complete ion depletion but not appreciably by ratio changes.
Find yourself in there? Grandpa got all the negative ions he ever needed through the cold air leaks all over his house. But at today's heating prices, that's an expensive supply source. How does your modern sealed, metal ducted,and synthetically furnished house stack up? How about your office? Thats why I care about negative ions.
The story continues with Why Don't We Hear About Negative Ion Depletion?.
The story started with What the Heck is a Negative Ion?