What is an Air Ionizer Used For?

At one point you have probably heard or read somewhere about air ionizers, but the information presented did not fully cover the most important question: what is an air ionizer even used for?

To fully explain this question we should first recap some basics. Air ionizers are a type of air purifier that work by releasing negative ions into the air. Negative ions are very unstable and seek to attach themselves to the first positive particle they can find. Luckily the air we breathe is filled with positive particles – these are dust, smoke, pollen, bacteria, viruses,… So after negative ions attach themselves to one of these particles, the mass becomes big enough for gravity to bring them down. Once this newly formed mass reaches the floor it can not get up into the air again. This is great news because that means that all the harmful particles cannot get back into the air- this is amazing especially for our lungs because they get to stay healthy this way. We illustrate this simple process in the picture below.

(source: Teqoya)

So what do you do with these harmful particles once they are on the ground thanks to negative ions? Quite simply, you can just sweep them away. Out of sight out of mind.

Back to our main question – so what is an air ionizer used for?

Now that we did a quick recap we can move on to the most important part of this article. These are the uses:

Clean air

We would argue that air ionizers are the most effective type of air purifiers that currently exist. The simplest reason for this is that negative ions can remove even the smallest harmful particles in the air. Other popular purifiers, such as ones that use HEPA filters,  are very effective as well – but they are limited. This is because HEPA filters can clean everything in the air except the smallest of particles and usually it is exactly the smallest ones that have the most dangerous effects on our body. Ionizers, on the other hand, have no such limits and protect our lungs and our health from any harmful particle in the air. Consequently viruses, fumes, smoke, bacteria, allergens, pollen, dust, soot, smog no longer present a problem in your household.

This is great news because air pollution is becoming a bigger and bigger problem each year. More and more people keep getting sick and ultimately die because of it. Do not even get us started on how unclean the air is indoors.

A natural remedy for allergies and asthma

Yes, you read that right. Air ionizers can be a great “natural” solution for allergies and asthma. This is all thanks to negative ions which have antihistamine properties. Once they are in our body they naturally lower our histamine levels, without any side effects at all. For this it is urgent that we do as much ionic therapy as we can. Ionic therapy simply means breathing negative ions as close to the ionizer as you can. As we inhale negative ions into our body they start to lower our histamine which translates into less allergic reactions and less asthmatic attacks. The longterm goal of ionic therapy is the complete removal of asthma and allergies.

While this looks great on paper there is only one issue – the vast majority of ionizers produce ozone. Ozone is great in the atmosphere because it protects us from UV-B radiation from the sun. However, ozone is harmful if we directly inhale it because it can damage the lungs when we inhale it. Even a small amount of inhaled ozone can cause pain in the chest area, irritations, coughing and shortness of breath. This is why it is absolutely necessary that we choose an air ionizer that does not produce any amount of ozone! Only then we can safely start doing ionic therapy to combat allergies and asthma.

Ionizers that use any type of membrane, plasma or steel needle are therefore not the best choices because they all do release ozone. There are ionizers on the market that do not release ozone. Those are the kind you should be looking to get if you plan to do ionic therapy.

Health benefits of negative ions

Negative ions also have some pretty great and beneficial effects on our body and overall health, proven by scientific research. They have an influence on:

• the nervous system
• the respiratory system – they prevent common cold, bronchitis, and asthma
• thyroid gland, vitality, and concentration
• decrease of pain, associated with migraines, injuries, and burns
• regulation of blood pressure and heart rate
• lowering the levels of histamine and allergens
• improving our body`s natural defense and vitality

We will not go deeper into these individual benefits in this blog post, however, they can be found in the book Negative Ions as a Method of Healing.  The book also also contains a lot of scientific research. We recommend it to anyone that has an interest in this topic.

Preventive and curative roles at the same time

As you might have already started to suspect, air ionizer is used in both preventive and curative roles. Preventive role comes from negative ions picking up and removing all harmful particles in the air. As a result, we get clean air and in the process protect our lungs and health as no harmful particles can enter our bodies anymore. But when we already inhale allergens, viruses and other bacteria, air ionizer becomes a curative tool since negative ions also have beneficial effects on our body, as described in the paragraph above.

So there you have it, with this information you should be able to now know what an air ionizer is used for. As you can see they have many helpful roles in not only keeping the air clean but also improving our well-being. Be careful of ionizers that create ozone (steel needle, membrane, plasma) if you plan to do ionic therapy at any point.

For more information and other helpful posts regarding air ionizers feel free to visit our blog section.