A Message from Our Founder

There’s a dichotomy regarding hydrogen water and skepticism: Those who first hear about it, either health experts or the general population, automatically default to abnormally high levels of skepticism. Because of this, it’s a common trend among those promoting hydrogen water products to default to the belief that the science is being “unfairly attacked.” With 1500+ publications showing a benefit in 170 models across every organ in the mammalian body, including about 100 publications on humans and prominent Phase III clinical trials underway, how could anyone in their right mind ridicule it as pseudoscience and not see it as a promising area of research with potential, and at this point with likely significant benefits?
…
With millions of testimonials across the world and ongoing research from
public teams, how can skeptics say it is no better than placebo? How can the
average individual default to stating “all water has hydrogen” over and over,
when this misconception and lack of understanding is corrected continuously,
and the correct explanations are easily available?

Let’s get this straight for all my friends and allies: Skeptics are in the
right for questioning hydrogen water for many reasons. First, the onus of
proof is on the claimants (us), which we can provide in ample amounts, and
have throughout this website. As proponents we need to understand the
science on hydrogen therapy, whether it be hydrogen water, inhalation, or
saline. We also need to
understand how the scientific process works, and formulate
factual and logical positions, accurate with the findings, incorporating
appropriate reservations regarding limitations and what we do not yet know.
Over and over again hydrogen water, and hydrogen therapy, proponents do not
do this. They market products, often complete scams or with dosages and
concentrations so low they cannot be efficacious, and greatly exaggerate, or
misunderstand, the claims and potential benefits. This is why I started the
“Hydrogen Water Reviews” and
“Hydrogen Water Scams” pages, to root out the
bad actors in the industry.

Testimonials Are Not Good Evidence

As I wrote about in my
Open Letter Regarding Testimonials, while
testimonials are important and need to be considered, and are often the
basis of why pilot research begins, they are the lowest form of evidence.
Regarding hydrogen water and other hydrogen therapies, the majority of the
research is in vitro or in animal models. The human research is
predominantly small pilot studies on many indications with little
replication work (outside perhaps exercise and metabolic conditions), with
some being uncontrolled trials and others case studies. This is changing
year by year, and as the trials are becoming larger and more controlled,
with better dosing regimens, the results have actually been trending
stronger. This is important. If it was just “noise,” the larger and more
controlled studies would be showing negative results, but they aren’t. They
are overwhelmingly becoming more significant. Each year it is more apparent
molecular hydrogen therapy, most prevalently hydrogen water, is exerting
beneficial outcomes in many human models. The questions remaining include
the following:

1. When should hydrogen therapy be administered? (as in preventative, in a
   rescuing manner, for what populations, and what time of day, etc.)
2. What dosages are ideal?
3. What administration route is best? (i.e., hydrogen water, hydrogen-rich
   hydrotherapy, hydrogen saline, hydrogen inhalation, or combinations of any
   of these)

Literature Reviews vs. Systematic Reviews

While there are many reviews on hydrogen therapy for various targets, they
are literature reviews and not systematic reviews. Literature reviews are
subjective articles, opinion-based, and designed to give an overview on a
subject. Systematic reviews are far more thorough and assess the credibility
and merit of each individual study and are done in a manner attempting to
remove bias. A full comparison between the differences on literature and
systematic reviews can be found
here.

While hydrogen therapy research is working its way up the pyramid, it isn’t
all the way up. There are a lot of questions we still need to answer and
years of clinical research to be done to formulate clear protocols for
different situations, if at all.

Reasons for Skeptics to Default to Derision

The next question that often comes up in those convinced of the benefits of
hydrogen water is why is the research in this area attacked more fervently
than others with far less science? Molecules with a few in vitro articles
and even less in rodents, none in humans, are often heralded as “promising”
and given a boost in the media, garnering attention and further research,
while the mainstream media on hydrogen research has been largely devoid of
positive coverage on hydrogen water. The coverage it gets is often that it
has “no basis in science” and has “no evidence.” While I could begrudge the
situation and lay blame, I’d prefer to dissect the reasoning and pursue
solutions regarding education, encouraging discourse with those skeptical.

Why do skeptics default to immediate skepticism and derision? The same
reasons I did, the same reason my cofounder Dr. Holland did, and the same
reasons many, many others have. As I detail in my “hydrogen tablets origins
series,” I knew of the potential of molecular hydrogen for years before I
finally became excited about it. I engaged in heated arguments with
proponents of ionized water and their illegal and dubious claims. Dr.
Holland’s original first email to me stated this:

“I have been designing and synthesizing drugs for over 15 years and have a
lot of experience in the requirements needed for a compound to prove its
effects in a double blind randomized clinical trial, and this formulation
would never pass those requirements. The formulation that you are talking
about is pseudo science at best and has absolutely no health benefits other
than those experienced by placebo.”

— Dr. Holland, 2015

As many of you know, within a few months he was a partner in the company and
excited about hydrogen water research and what we were doing. As he stated
in our recorded conversation, he isn’t
sure how many patents he has, but the work we did on our hydrogen tablets is
one of his proudest achievements.

Most skeptics, or individuals with appropriately developed critical thinking
skills, have a formed heuristic regarding “magic water” and immediately
dismiss and attack any claims as such. Unfortunately, many proponents of
hydrogen water position it as a magical panacea, which it is not, and many
others insert other pseudoscientific water-related claims, further muddying
the science. I discussed this in my
“100 voices” article: What has happened in
Korea and Japan and why I decided to private label my technology.

“A desperate situation may arise if a new skill, the efficacy of which is
open to doubt, is given a false interpretation by its discoverers.”

— Michael Polanyi, Personal Knowledge: Towards a PostCcritical Philosophy

Health Experts and Hydrogen Water Skepticism

Further complicating matters and increasing skepticism is that the first
reaction of most educated in biochemistry, physiology, or even chemistry,
and engineers trained in gas solubility is that none of this makes sense.
Hydrogen gas is inert, and most do not expect it will have any biological
effect. This is further exacerbated by the fact it is not particularly
soluble in water. In fact, carbon dioxide is over
1000x as soluble!</a >
While this would seem to further drive the nail in the coffin of hydrogen
water, literature reviews on the topic have noted that hydrogen gas
dissolved in water is roughly 100x as effective per dose as inhalation.
ⁱ As I have noted in a published hypothesis paper, this could
have
evolutionary explanations</a >. One liter of saturated hydrogen water produces just 1.6mg of molecular
hydrogen. While 1.6mg seems like a very small amount, particularly for a gas
most deem to be inert, when considering “moles,” 1.6mg of H₂ is
comparable to 139mg of Vitamin C. Even when considering in milligrams, many
molecules have an effect at levels far below 1.6mg. Of course, one of our
tablets provides about 4x this amount, and some of the clinical research
using our hydrogen tablets administers several tablets per day.

Our hydrogen tablets get further skepticism from engineers, chemists, and
physicists for the fact that we deliver several times what is allowable
under standard ambient temperature and pressure (SATP), when considering
both dissolved and quasi-dissolved gas. We at Drink HRW were even extremely
skeptical of what was going on, and our discovery was not a “eureka” moment,
but a “that’s funny” moment, in line with one of my favorite quotes from
Isaac Asimov:

“The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new
discoveries, is not ‘Eureka!’ but ‘That’s funny…’”.

We feel comfortable with our claims, as before we made them, we submitted
them to numerous skeptical third parties to falsify, while simultaneously
attempting to falsify ourselves. In science, assertions cannot be “proven
true,” they simply fail to be “proven false.” After a battery of tests,
including thorough gas chromatography, and the attempted attacks from all
competitors, what we have done has not been “proven false,” with results
replicated through many tests and many third parties. This simply means the
results are “likely true,” although with new technology, controls, and
testing methods in the future, our position and claims may need to be
adjusted based on new evidence.

Even with the knowledge regarding moles, our ability to deliver several
times the dosage, and the existing literature, many other issues still
exist. Importantly, we do not yet know the exact mechanism of action of
hydrogen gas. Meaning, we know many of the pathways it works by, have noted
thousands of changes in gene expression, etc., but we do not know how it
does this. Even if the hydrogen gas as a form of hormesis hypothesis holds
true, we do not know why it is a form of physiological stress, as the safety
is so well established, and the dosing is so much lower than even slight
narcosis during deep sea diving. My hypothesis paper on evolutionary origins
could partly explain this, and I have proposed a trial design to several
teams that could further elucidate on molecular hydrogen’s role in our
cells. However, as of yet it is just an untested hypothesis.

Complicating this matter further, many of the early, and current, research
papers draw conclusions that do not make sense. This often happens,
especially in green literature, when researchers do not have an expert
appropriate to one area to correct conclusions. For instance, a conclusion
based on the data from a medical doctor may seem absurd to a biochemist.
What is important is that we do not disregard the data due to erroneous
conclusions. We do need to seek correct conclusions and clarifications
especially when the prevailing conclusions have yet to be reconciled with
other known facts. It is our duty to pursue correct conclusions and drive
towards a greater and more coherent understanding of the subject.

“Whenever truth and error are amalgamated in a coherent system of
conceptions, the destructive analysis of the system can lead to correct
conclusions only when supplemented by new discoveries. But there exists no
rule for making fresh discoveries or inventing truer concepts, and hence
there can be no rule, either, for avoiding the uncertainty of destructive
analysis.”

— Michael Polanyi, Personal Knowledge: Towards a Post-Critical Philosophy

Knowledge is growing at an unfathomable rate. So is pseudo-knowledge. We
need to form snap judgements to dismiss ideas that seem inappropriate in
order to prioritize what we learn and what we avoid. Often the media seeks
quotes from doctors or health specialists who have no background knowledge
in hydrogen water, asking these experts for an opinion potential benefits.
Since often they have never heard of hydrogen water, and typically have
formed heuristics regarding “magic waters”, the tendency is for them to be
immediately dismissive of hydrogen water. The overwhelming odds are that
they are completely unfamiliar with the research, and as such have to state
they are skeptical of any benefits. This has more to do with “lazy
journalism” with authors failing to understand that expertise in one area
does not necessarily translate to an accurate and trustworthy opinion in
another area. Further exacerbating this is the trend of negative articles,
so journalists read what their peers have published and enter the subject
with a bias.

I do not fault the journalists, or even the experts quoted for this. I do
not fault the skeptics for their skepticism. The blame falls solely on the
proponents of hydrogen water and gas research that have not been loud
enough, coherent enough, and convincing enough. Without education, debate,
and attention, there is no way to educate those skeptical to change their
opinions.

“This example should stand for many others which teach the same lesson;
namely that to deny the feasibility of something that is alleged to have
been done or the possibility of an event that is supposed to have been
observed, merely because we cannot understand in terms of our hitherto
framework how it could have been done or could have happened, may often
result in explaining away quite genuine practices or experiences. Yet this
method of criticism is indispensable, and without its constant exercise no
scientist or technician could keep a steady course among the many spurious
observations which he has to set aside unexplained every day.”

— Michael Polanyi, Personal Knowledge: Towards a Post-Critical Philosophy

Conversely, as proponents of the research we need to do our best to reject
dubious claims and educate other proponents towards accurate statements. Our
allies are in a position to do us more harm than good, running the risk of a
“guilt by association” situation. Even claims that seem innocuous can lead
to a false perception of the truth, or increase skepticism. Recently, my
friend Prof. Ostojic published a paper regarding false claims on hydrogen
water.
ⁱⁱ He touched on important topics such as unsubstantiated claims
made from a medical perspective and products claiming the benefits of H_{2</sub >
that contain no, or below the therapeutic threshold of, Hii . He
also touched on something that surprised me and gave me pause to consider my
own opinions and reflect on what I have stated before without proof.}

In a search of the literature, he found no mention of hydrogen levels in the
“miracle spring waters” at sites such as Nordenau and Lourdes. This is
something that is heavily referenced in marketing and writing across all
proponents of hydrogen water, and I have heard other researchers state it as
well. Perhaps there are trace amounts of hydrogen water at these sites, but
we need to publish proof of it. It is not preposterous to think there could
be. For instance, sampling the oldest water ever discovered in the world
(Ontario, Canada estimated to be 1 billion years old) detected dissolved
hydrogen gas.
ⁱⁱⁱ The onus of proof is on the claimant, and to make even an
innocuous claim as such, proof must be provided.

Further, we must do our best to be critical of the research coming out on
hydrogen water, to search for errors and flaws. We cannot use every new
study as a form of confirmation bias. The more we want something to be true,
the more critical of the results we must be. If we are not, those attacking
the field will be, and if we have not considered all of the possibilities
even if we are right and the results are true, we will not be prepared to
debate.

True knowledge leads to true doubt. Experts are not experts in a field
because they know everything, they are experts because they understand the
limitations and what is not known and realize others have not made it to
this realization yet. By using new information as confirmation bias, we risk
depriving ourselves from ever obtaining true understanding and true
expertise.

Science relies on skepticism to move forward. Without challenges to ideas,
it cannot evolve and grow. Without skepticism, both from active researchers
on the subject and those outside the field, there is no direction except
towards confirmation bias. That outcome is not science, but engineering a
result to prove a hypothesis, or pseudoscience. Skeptics make us all better,
and we should thank them. Science adjusts its views based on what’s
observed. If we want to call hydrogen water real science, we must do
likewise and continuously adjust our positions when confronted with new
evidence. We must also understand the science behind our positions, so we
can work towards adjusting the views of skeptics — the only path towards
truth.

While my enthusiasm of hydrogen water is very high, I am much more hesitant
to make grand claims than others. The more I understand, the more hesitant I
am. For all of you reading, while hydrogen water has great promise and the
research is exciting, it has a long way to go. The greater the claims you
make, the greater the evidence needed to justify them.

“Exceptional claims demand exceptional evidence.”

— Christopher Hitchens

Of course, I also argued why we know enough about how hydrogen therapy
works. If you want to continue reading, I suggest my article
“We Know Enough About How H₂ Works.”

1. ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
2. sciencedirect.com
3. cbc.ca