Human body needs three requisites for its smooth functioning – oxygen,water and food in that order. Our first requirement to live is oxygen since we cannot survuvive more than a few minutes without taking oxygen. Water has been ranked as second only to oxygen as essential for life because we can stay for a few days without drinking water.
Then comes the food. Human body is made up of two-thirds of water and one-third of solid matter. The average adult body is 55 to 75% water. A human embryo is more than 80% water. A newborn baby is 74% water. Human survival is dependent on water.
Water is more important than matter for our body and the ratio of 2:1 should be maintained everyday. Every activity in the body is propelled by water. It is the water, which is responsible for two third of activity in the body.The supply of all-important water to the body helps it to perform its duties perfectly maintaining good health. There is no harm to the body even if we skip food once in a day.
The food stored in the body comes handy when we skip food. However, if we do not drink water for some time or for a whole day it triggers serious trouble inside.It is wrong to think that if we drink water once it will be stored for a long time and meets the needs of the body. Water is beneficial only when we take it whenever body needs it. As food is emptied from stomach, water is also emptied from the body from time to time. As we fill the empty stomach with food we must also supply water to the body.
If the body has to get full benefit of the food we eat, it is possible only through water. The benefit to the body from the higher quantity and expensive food we eat is possible if the water we take is adequate.Nowadays man eats many varieties of food and yet his energy is low. If we reduce food intake by 50 per cent we can work more vigorously and can put in more hours of work.Unless we experience it for ourselves we will not know about the benefit of consuming plenty of water. If we are to understand the need for more water we should know as to where this three fourths of water in our body exists, what form it takes, what it does, what is the difficulty the body faces when water level comes down, how much water is spent in the body, what are the likely symptoms when water level is reduced, the relation between kidneys and water, the relation of water to salt etc.
Water also has a role to play as disease preventive tool. It is said that drinking 8-10 glasses of water each day considerably reduces the risk of all sorts of cancers- like colon cancer, breast cancer, bladder cancer etc. Water helps our body to absorb nutrients in the intestines and it is the base material for saliva, which plays important role in our digestive system.
