> I'm 99% sure that any boiling will kill nearly all germs in water. I don't have facts on hand, but I do remember that once you get above ~160F, nearly all ger

> I'm 99% sure that any boiling will kill nearly all germs in water. I don't have facts on hand, but I do remember that once you get above ~160F, nearly all germs are dead. So boiling water will definitely kill everything. Occasionally I find out that something that I thought / hoped / believed to be the case ... wasn't. Killing 'nearly all germs' is good, but not really what you need when you may get sick or die from the kinds of germs that don't fit the 'nearly all' category. Cryptosporidium and giardia (two things that Sydney residents became overly familiar with before our Olympic hosting) require a few minutes of rolling boil to kill. And the definition of 'rolling boil' becomes more onerous as you increase your altitude.