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WHO’S SCAMMING WHOM WITH
COLLOIDAL SILVER?
On January 10, 2003 Wired
News published an article on “silver health scams,”
www.wired.com/news/medtech/0,1286,57119,00.html. It treated us
to horror stories about the dangers of using colloidal silver --
your skin will turn grey or blue from silver “poisoning” (argyria,
ar JEE ree uh ) and you’ll become a walking freak show.
The main complainant,
Rosemary Jacobs, contracted argyria nearly 50 years ago from using
silver nose drops. All things considered, she must have been taking
massive doses, since argyria is a relatively rare condition
and requires enormous exposure. Also pictured with the article is
Montana libertarian Stan Jones, self-described “Blue Man” who
developed argyria after consuming a “homemade silver concoction”
daily for 4-1/2 years. How much he consumed isn’t
mentioned. If you go to the article above, you’ll see pictures and
find more information.
Since I interviewed Bill
McFarland, manufacturer of Mild Silver Protein, a colloidal silver
preparation (see 9/01 Moneychanger), I felt obliged to ask
some knowledgeable people about these charges to try to come to
accurate opinion. “Knowledgeable people” includes both McFarland
and two physicians who have used some form of colloidal silver.
HUMAN STUPIDITY
Obviously, there’s no cure
for this. A very large overdose of silver colloid is
necessary to turn anyone blue. How much nose drops did
Rosemary Jacobs use, and for how long? With all due respect to Stan
Jones, what in the world was he thinking about? No medicine
ought to be taken in massive doses daily forever. There are
thousands of these homemade colloidal silver generators on the
market, and the people who sell them promote them as cure-alls. The
problem is, most of them offer no quality or dosage control at all.
Some use silver wire imported from China contaminated with heavy
metals. The sellers often tell people to take the product from
these generators daily to ward off disease.
Interestingly, the only side
effect Stan Jones suffers is cosmetic, although in especially
severe cases argyria can involve organ damage. But still, can you
imagine what he would look like if he had taken daily massive doses
of antibiotics for 4-1/2 years?
WHAT ARE THEY TAKING?
There’s not much telling what
people are actually getting from these home-made colloidal silver
generators. In addition, from the 1930s into the 1950s lots of
silver products were available, some notoriously unstable. Often
doctors prepared these themselves, with all the variability of
composition that implies. Many used elemental silver, rather than
colloidal silver, which is a tiny amount in colloidal suspension.
Whoever turned blue in the 1950s probably wasn't using silver
colloids, which contain a very small amount, but instead a
high-silver-dose medicinal then available. If one uses colloidal
silver of 10-40 parts per million (PPM) for a few days at 1
teaspoon every 3-4 hours to fight an infection, and then stops,
the odds of turning blue are exceptionally small.
DOES IT WORK?
The Wired News article tries
to imply that colloidal silver is not effective as an antibiotic,
but that’s just not true. Silver’s effectiveness as a bacteria
killer is widely known, and widely used in preparations such as
Silvadene® (silver sulfadiazine) burn ointment and in water
purification systems. Because silver seems to kill mechanically or
electrically, bacteria don’t develop a resistance to it as they do
to modern antibiotics.
ANECDOTES, NOT TESTIMONIALS
I personally have used the
Mild Silver Protein (400 ppm) that Bill McFarland manufactures. I
have not turned blue yet (although once in a while I do get a little
sad.) I have never taken massive daily doses over long periods, but
only 4-5 tablespoons per day for serious infections for a few days.
The average dose is 3-4 teaspoons per day. I have ingested it for
colds and other illnesses. Mixed with a 10-20 drops of DMSO as a
spray, I have used it externally for fungus, yeast
infections, mastitis (in a dairy cow), and even warts, and still
do. I have also used it on other farm animals. Something
killed the warts while I was using the MSP spray. Something
kills athlete’s foot and yeast infections when I use the MSP spray.
Now I am not offering this a
“scientific proof” that MSP is effective and without side effects, I
am only recounting my own experience. Yours may be different. If I
had some antibiotic resistant bacterial or a viral infection, I
would not hesitate to take MSP internally or even intravenously, but
that’s just my opinion, and I’m not a physician. One thing for
sure: I would never take any medication continuously, just
as a protective measure. Note particularly that although in the
past I have used homemade colloidal silver generators, I would no
longer use them and do not recommend them.
Whenever I interview
anyone about alternative medicine, readers must know and assume that
I am offering that interview as information only. Neither the
person interviewed nor The Moneychanger recommends any medical
therapy for any reader. You have to make that decision for
yourself, consulting with your local health care professional.
If you have questions about
Bill McFarland’s Mild Silver Protein, you can contact him at Route
3, Box 109, Opp, Alabama or call (800) 339-5060.
-- F. Sanders
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