Many people now associate the term ”colloidal silver” with the peculiar statements made by the media and authorities in recent years. Through these channels, we have heard that silver is toxic, creates antibiotic-resistant bacteria, and poses an environmental threat. These statements, presented by the media, have become ”truths,” but for various reasons, they lack a basis in real life. In this article, we will investigate these claims further. We will also delve into the science behind colloidal silver and share a variety of experiences related to the treatment of different health symptoms.
The basis for the statements made by the media and authorities in recent years lies in the fact that colloidal silver is so potent and useful that it often encroaches into areas where one would typically find various patented pharmaceuticals. Colloidal silver has a broad effect on fungi, viruses, bacteria, and single-celled parasites like amoebas and protozoa. The malaria parasite Plasmodium is a good example of a single-celled parasite that colloidal silver effectively eliminates. The product is increasingly being used in Africa, providing fast results in cases of malaria, among other things. In other words, colloidal silver poses a significant threat to the products marketed by the pharmaceutical industry, and that’s why every effort is made to remove colloidal silver from the market.
So, what does a colloid mean? It’s when very small microscopic particles are freely suspended in a liquid. This extremely finely dispersed form creates conditions for generating a very large surface area that effectively attacks invading microorganisms. Milk is usually cited as an example of a colloid. Colloidal silver consists of microscopic silver particles and silver ions dissolved in water. A particle can consist of one or several clustered silver atoms, while a silver ion is a silver atom that has lost an electron and, thus, acquired a positive charge. A silver ion is the smallest form that silver can take. It is said that silver ions are dissolved in water, or more precisely, they are part of a chemical compound with the hydrogen and oxygen that make up the water.
Modernly manufactured electro-colloidal silver consists of silver particles and silver ions excreted into water by electrical means. The water used is purified through distillation or reverse osmosis, supplemented by deionization. Through deionization, the last impurities that the reverse osmosis filter cannot handle, typically calcium and magnesium ions, are removed. The result is very pure water devoid of contaminants. Colloidal silver with a strength of 10 ppm (Parts Per Million or millionths) contains 10 mg of pure silver per liter. These are incredibly small quantities. Nonetheless, the product is extremely rich because every cubic millimeter contains several billion silver atoms in the form of ions or particles, all of which can help neutralize fungi, viruses, bacteria, and even single-celled parasites.
Is pure silver toxic?
Our authorities and media have put a lot of effort in recent years into trying to make people believe that silver is toxic. The truth is that pure silver is a non-toxic mineral for mammalian cells that is neither carcinogenic nor mutagenic. Those who claim otherwise either cannot or simply do not want to differentiate pure silver from toxic silver salts produced by dissolving silver in nitric acid (HNO3). The end result is silver nitrate, a toxic, coloring, and corrosive product. Toxicity comes from the acid component and its nitrate ion (N). Electro-colloidal silver does not contain any acid but is produced through an electrical process.
People often hear how some claim that silver is a ”toxic heavy metal,” which is completely wrong. In fact, most metals are by definition heavy metals, but who worries about us containing zinc, copper, and iron, which are also, by definition, heavy metals. Many chemists want to get rid of the term ”heavy metal” because it does not provide any information about the substance in question and is now almost exclusively used to scare people.
The reasoning is that it is the toxicity of the metal that should be classified instead. Nevertheless, some Swedish researchers insist on claiming that silver is a ”toxic heavy metal.” What these researchers brazenly do is equate pure silver with the toxic silver salts that can be created by dissolving silver in nitric acid. They should know better, one would think. Silver nitrate, also known as lapis, is one such silver salt product that exhibits strong toxic, coloring, and corrosive properties.
An acknowledged reference in the field of toxic metals, the Dartmouth Toxic Metals Research Program, states the following about pure silver: ”Unlike other metals such as lead and mercury, silver is not toxic to humans and is not known to cause cancer, reproductive or neurological damage, or other chronic adverse effects. Nor has normal day-to-day contact with solid silver coins, spoons, or bowls been found to affect human health. This is because solid silver is almost completely biologically inert, and even if ingested, would pass through the human body without being absorbed into tissues.”
”Trace amounts of silver are in the bodies of all humans and animals. We normally take in between 70 and 88 micrograms of silver a day, half of that amount from our diet. Humans have evolved with efficient methods of dealing with that intake; over 99 percent is readily excreted from the body.”
Wikipedia states [2]: ”Silver-ions and silver compounds show a toxic effect on some bacteria, viruses, algae, and fungi typical for heavy metals like lead or mercury, but without the high toxicity to humans that is normally associated with them. Its germicidal effects kill many microbial organisms in vitro.” It goes on to say: ”Silver itself is not toxic but most silver salts are, and some may be carcinogenic.”
According to these sources, pure silver is established as non-toxic, and the human body contains an efficient detoxification system that ensures we do not accumulate excessive amounts of silver. This is in stark contrast to what authorities have tried to make us believe in recent years. The question is, why?
Silver is an element found in nature, and therefore, it is present in the food we eat and the water we drink. There is a world of difference between the non-toxic silver ions generated through electrical processes and the toxic, pharmaceutical-class silver products from the 20th century, which were based on silver dissolved in nitric acid.
We have always obtained silver through our diet. The real problem, which is rarely discussed, is that we now receive one-tenth as much silver in our diet as we did 40 years ago.
Does colloidal silver not affect the beneficial bacteria in the gut? Many people are concerned about how colloidal silver use might affect the beneficial gut bacteria. Studies actually show that the silver ions in the product do not affect the beneficial gut bacteria such as acidophilus and bifidus at all. This is because these gram-positive lactic acid bacteria have a thicker cell wall than the gram-negative pathogenic bacteria one might want to target. That’s where the difference lies. An American manufacturer of colloidal silver conducted a study that confirms this [3].
Other sources have had similar experiences: ”Former teacher of physics and chemistry, Howard Mitchell of Virginia, recently conducted a series of experiments with colloidal silver. He found that colloidal silver has no effect on acidophilus, the ”good bacteria” found in the stomach. Mitchell used concentrations forty times higher than what might be expected to destroy other forms of bacteria. It shows that even in large dosages, the intestinal flora will flourish. In fact, there is speculation that the silver ions may be advantageous in stimulating a vigorous growth of beneficial bacteria, helping to boost the immune system.”
Even if the good bacteria were affected by silver, the amounts of silver reaching the area where the good bacteria reside are so minuscule that the large population of good bacteria in the intestines is not affected. Silver ions also need a colloidal environment, such as blood or intracellular and extracellular cell fluids, to function. When it comes to a colon lined with large bacterial colonies, the silver cannot penetrate the thick plaque of bacteria that populates the inside of the colon. This is yet another reason why these small amounts of colloidal silver do not have a negative effect on the beneficial gut bacteria.
However, there is strong evidence that colloidal silver can help the good gut bacteria by eliminating pathogenic bacterial strains that have grown too much after various courses of antibiotics and have more or less outcompeted the good bacterial strains. Many people report better results than with many probiotic supplements and often find relief from chronic diarrhea and other gastrointestinal issues. To reach as far down in the intestines as possible, users often mix a tablespoon of colloidal silver in a drinking glass with regular water. They then drink it as quickly as possible, and the large volume of liquid usually reaches further down the intestines than a single teaspoon of colloidal silver would.
The authorities’ own limit values
The WHO (World Health Organization) and the EPA (U.S. Environmental Protection Agency) have defined a no-observed-adverse-effect level (NOAEL) for silver, which corresponds to 350 micrograms (mcg) of silver per day for 70 years. This amount is equivalent to consuming 7 teaspoons per day of a 10 ppm (parts per million) strength product. Staying below the NOAEL means there is no risk of experiencing the only confirmed side effect of excessive silver intake, which is argyria. Argyria is a cosmetic condition in which the skin takes on a slightly gray or even bluish hue. It can occur after accumulating more than approximately 10 grams of silver in the body’s tissues. This safety data is the basis for all colloidal silver use in the United States.
If you were to take six teaspoons per day, it would take over 80 years to consume 10 grams of silver. 0.1 gram of silver is what you would consume annually.
The EPA has also determined that silver ions are so non-toxic that it would require simultaneous ingestion of between 2 and 5 grams of silver per kilogram of body weight before it becomes toxic. This means that an 80-kilogram adult male would tolerate between 160-400 grams of pure silver in silver ion form. This is equivalent to between 16,000-40,000 liters of colloidal silver. Please note that this applies to a single ingestion. You would die from the water long before you consumed that much silver. Large quantities of water would dilute your blood to a point where you would suffer water intoxication, essentially drowning from the inside. Therefore, water can be said to be 2000 times more toxic than the silver in the product.
Silver, a historically safe and effective mineral
If one were to be concerned that we might not have enough historical experience with silver, we know that silver has been used as an antibacterial substance since ancient times. The ancient Greeks, for instance, sprinkled silver powder on infected wounds. It was, in fact, the father of medicine, Hippocrates, who popularized this use. There are also reports of finding amphorae in sunken ancient wrecks where residues of olives were discovered. What they have noticed is that relatively high levels of silver were found in the content when analyzed. Everything suggests that silver was probably used as a preservative as far back as ancient times. The Persian king Cyrus stored water and wine in silver-coated vessels, you could say it was the refrigerator of that era.
Colloidal Silver, the Precursor to Antibiotics
The first time we hear about colloidal silver is actually in the late 19th century. Before the invention of penicillin in 1928, silver was the active antibacterial substance in around 90 different medicines marketed by the pharmaceutical industry itself. These medicines were up to 30,000 times stronger (300,000 ppm) than today’s weak 10 ppm electro-colloidal silver. These medicines often involved a process in which silver was dissolved in nitric acid, resulting in silver nitrate as the final product. Silver nitrate is known to be toxic, staining, and corrosive, primarily due to the acidic component. Well-known silver-based medicines from this era include Argyrol and Protargol.
In the book ”Colloids in Health and Disease,” which is available to read on the Internet, one can learn about all the applications of Colossal Argentum (the colloidal silver of that time) in the 1920s when the book was written [4]. It mentions various applications, including eye and ear diseases, nose, throat, sinuses, acne, leg ulcers, ringworm, eczema, gonorrhea, dysentery, intestinal disorders, and abscesses, to name a few. The now-extinct group of physicians of that era had good knowledge of how to administer different silver products. Many lives were ultimately saved by intravenous injections of colloidal silver.
The authorities and media that now claim that colloidal silver could be dangerous often do not distinguish between modern electro-colloidal silver and the often silver nitrate-based products from the past, which were up to 30,000 times stronger. If they were aware of the difference, they would at least not pretend it doesn’t exist, as making false claims about harmful effects would be impossible.
Studies show that electrically generated silver ions are not only non-toxic to mammalian cells but are also significantly more effective than silver ions released from silver nitrate. The nitrate ion in silver nitrate negatively affects the silver ions. In a 1992 study, it was observed that electrically generated silver ions killed gram-negative E. coli bacteria 20% faster, Pseudomonas aeruginosa 60% faster, and that silver ions generated from silver nitrate had no effect on Candida albicans (yeast) or Aspergillus niger (mold). However, electrically generated silver ions did have an effect. The authors concluded that ”Electro colloidal silver Ag(e) was significantly more effective than silver nitrate AgNo3” [5].
Throughout the entire 20th century, when strong silver medicines were used, there were only around 300 recorded cases of the cosmetic side effect argyria. Nevertheless, they now attempt to claim that a product not based on silver nitrate, consisting of particles thousands of times smaller and being 30,000 times weaker, could lead to a lot of blue individuals. The purpose, of course, is to scare people away from understanding how truly useful colloidal silver is. This scare propaganda goes against the scientifically grounded safety data published by both the World Health Organization (WHO) and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regarding silver.
The truth is that the WHO’s safety data for pure silver show that you can consume up to 10 grams of pure silver in a lifetime without exceeding the agency’s No Observed Adverse Effect Level (NOAEL). These levels are completely safe and do not result in the slightest undesirable side effects from silver intake. 10 grams of pure silver equate to one thousand liters of a 10 ppm colloidal silver.
The agency has also set a lowest threshold at which you might risk developing argyria. This is known as the Lowest Observed Adverse Effect Level (LOAEL) and is set at 25 grams of consumed silver. This amount corresponds to two thousand five hundred liters of a 10 ppm colloidal silver. It’s worth noting that it’s only at 25 grams of consumed silver that there is any risk of argyria according to the authorities. Even 25 grams of consumed silver doesn’t guarantee the development of argyria. These intake levels don’t take into account the body’s natural pathways for eliminating silver. The body constantly rids itself of silver.
The authorities themselves acknowledge that 90-99 percent of the intake is excreted within a day. It’s interesting to note that many experts believe that silver must be consumed in the form of a silver salt (e.g., silver nitrate or silver chloride) to accumulate in tissues and subsequently undergo photoreduction, resulting in the color change seen in argyria.
In other words, the NOAEL and LOAEL limits are incorrectly set because they assume that all silver accumulates. At the same time, the authorities admit that the majority of the silver is excreted more or less immediately…
Safe in Modern Times Too
Silver has been used as a safe and effective water purification agent for centuries. In recent times, electric systems have been developed to release silver ions into drinking water that needs to be kept free from microorganisms. Large ships have been equipped with silver ionizers since the 1950s to help keep drinking water fresh and potable, benefiting millions of crew members and passengers with the effective inhibition of microorganisms by silver ions.
In space, NASA chose silver ionizers for both the Apollo program in the 1960s and the subsequent space shuttle program. The Soviet Union did the same in its space program. Claiming that silver ions are unsafe to use is a blow to science and proven experience. The place where safety is paramount is undoubtedly in space programs! Silver has been proven, since ancient times, to be both effective and harmless to higher organisms time and time again.
Modern colloidal silver is based on nanotechnology
Colloidal silver is a product that can truly be classified as nanotechnology, an area where the exciting properties that emerge when components become one or a few nanometers in size are exploited. One effect that colloidal silver utilizes is the enormous total surface area of silver generated by billions of nanometer-sized particles. It is this large surface area’s contact with microorganisms that produces effective results.
A properly produced electro-colloidal silver is usually referred to as ”oligodynamic.” The word comes from the Greek oligos, meaning small or few, and dynamis, meaning force. It implies that so little of the substance in question is needed that it has no negative effect on higher life forms (eukaryotic life forms, mammalian cells), but at the same time, it has a deadly effect on simpler, mainly single-celled organisms – primarily prokaryotic life forms. This includes bacteria in particular.
Ions or particles?
There are basically two types of modern electro-colloidal silver products. Firstly, there are products that are mainly ionic with only a minor presence of silver particles. These typically consist of 80-90% ions and the rest as particles. The second form is molecular, or non-ionized colloidal silver. Here, it’s the opposite, with particles accounting for 80-90% or more of the product, and the ionic part being almost nonexistent. So, which is the most effective form? This is still a subject of debate among various product manufacturers.
What is known with certainty, however, is that the reactive silver ion is responsible for the most effective bactericidal, fungicidal, and virucidal effects. The positively charged silver ion is attracted like a magnet to the typically negatively charged pathogenic bacteria. Once in contact with the bacteria, they cause such significant chemical and electrical disruption that the bacteria cease to function. To achieve a killing effect, silver particles in a molecular product must first convert to ionic form. They do this to some extent through mechanical friction and contact with a liquid, but a product that is already mostly ionic has a significant advantage because it bypasses the conversion phase from particles to ions. This conversion only happens with a small portion of the particles and is not very efficient compared to a product that is already mostly ionic.
There is also a significant size difference between the particles and the ions. A silver ion is no larger than a quarter of a nanometer (nm), while silver particles can range from a few nanometers to several hundred nanometers in size. In practice, a product where the majority is ionic from the start is the most effective product to use.
The body is not a test tube
Supporters of molecular silver often argue that ionic silver cannot survive in the body without reacting with chloride ions in the stomach and blood, forming silver chloride. In a test tube, this perspective would be entirely correct, but the body is a complex environment that contains relatively large amounts of ammonia, among other things. Ammonia has the property of dissolving silver chloride back into silver ions. Therefore, the truth is that there is a complex ongoing interaction constantly occurring in the body. Additionally, our bodies contain a large amount of special metalloproteins, a specific type of protein whose role is to encapsulate and protect reactive ions from reacting with various substances in the body.
This, in practical terms, means free passage to the cells where the mineral is then used by the body. Even saliva contains a significant amount of these proteins. The intestine also contains large amounts of metalloproteins. Without these metalloproteins, the body’s chemical systems would not function, and everything would start reacting with each other in one big jumble. Hemoglobin in the blood is an example of a metalloprotein that encapsulates iron, which, in turn, helps to bind oxygen.
Colloidal Silver, Clearly Unwanted by Authorities
A sure sign of how effective colloidal silver can be is the witch hunt that authorities subject the product to. In the United States, where colloidal silver has been used for much longer than in Sweden, people are more experienced. They are used to the methods that some forces employ to try to discredit the product. Their favorite tactic is to scare people away from using the product with the argument that you can turn both gray and blue. However, they never delve into how much silver or even what form of silver you would need to consume to undergo a color change – as that would entirely undermine the scare tactic.
Uncle Blue in the USA
Paul Karason is often brought up by the media as a cautionary example to deter people from using colloidal silver. Paul is the only living blue man in the world, and he has managed to become so by producing his own product, which he then drastically overconsumed. Sources that have been in contact with Paul confirm that he brewed his own colloidal silver and mistakenly added salt to the water to expedite the process. The salt increases the water’s conductivity, speeding up the manufacturing process. However, instead of a product consisting of pure silver ions in water, he ended up with silver chloride in water. This is because silver ions react with chloride ions from the salt, forming silver chloride, a silver compound with particle sizes around 200 nm. Compared to the tiny 0.24 nm size of silver ions, these are relatively large particles.
Paul’s product is also estimated to have been 100-200 ppm strong, and he consumed about 75 cl of this presumably murky liquid daily for fourteen years. During these years, he is estimated to have consumed 35 grams of silver in the form of relatively large particles that, due to their size, had the ability to become trapped under the skin. When exposed to sunlight, silver particles undergo photoreduction in the same way as developing photographic film, becoming dark and potentially causing a discoloration of the skin if there are enough of them. This discoloration can be perceived as gray and even blue.
Despite his appearance, Paul experienced a lot of positive results from his colloidal silver. He noted that his acid reflux, sinus issues, and rheumatic problems disappeared because of the colloidal silver: ”Because of some profound benefits that I had received from using it, like no more acid reflux, no more sinus troubles; my arthritis went away, he said.”
A TV channel paid for a complete medical examination for Paul and was surprised to find that he was perfectly healthy on the inside. All test results were normal. In other words, he had only suffered a cosmetic side effect caused by the form and large amount of silver he had consumed. Paul continues to use colloidal silver, but nowadays he uses a product without added salt and in more reasonable quantities.
In the USA, it is estimated that there are up to 10 million users of colloidal silver. If the problem of argyria were widespread, new cases would appear from time to time. However, they do not.
Which products should actually be banned?
The pharmaceutical industry and the media do their best to warn against the use of colloidal silver but can only find a single blue man who managed to make all sorts of mistakes when producing his own product. He has, however, gotten rid of his symptoms, continues to use the product in smaller amounts, and has only suffered a cosmetic side effect. Compare this to the hundreds of thousands of people who die each year due to the medications prescribed by the pharmaceutical industry. In the United States alone, 200,000 people die each year from medications prescribed by a doctor and taken as directed [6].
Colloidal silver is still sold as a dietary supplement in the USA, and a compilation by the U.S. National Poison Data System in 2011 states that for 27 years, not a single person in the USA has died from dietary supplements [7].
At the same time, official data shows that one of the riskiest things you can do in the USA is to visit a doctor. The chance of dying from a medication or being fatally mistreated far surpasses the risk of dying in a car accident, from alcohol, or tobacco.
The pharmaceutical industry, known for having access to the world’s largest lobbying force, actively seems to be working to ban competing products like vitamins, minerals, trace elements, and other essential substances. When they can’t ban them, they strive to set ”safe” intake levels so low that the substance itself has no effect. The pharmaceutical industry is also behind the witch hunt against colloidal silver that led the EU to ban silver for use in dietary supplements in 2010. Yet, silver is allowed in food.
The body’s natural detoxification pathways
As mentioned earlier, the body has various metalloproteins responsible for encapsulating different metal ions and transporting them to the cells. They also serve the purpose of clearing excess amounts. The body has a self-regulating system that strives for homeostasis – balance.
Without metalloproteins, the body’s intricate chemical systems would not function because all metal ions would react with, among other things, the chloride content in the body. Even saliva already contains a substantial amount of metalloproteins that encapsulate and protect silver ions from reacting with the chloride in the stomach’s hydrochloric acid.
Study on silver excretion
Researcher Roger Altman conducted a study on the intake and excretion of a 10 ppm (parts per million) colloidal silver solution. In the study, he consumed 2000 micrograms (2 mg) of silver daily for several months. This amount is almost seven times higher than the common recommended daily maximum dose of a 10 ppm colloidal silver when it was approved as a dietary supplement. Altman continually measured how the body eliminated silver, both through urine and feces [8].
Roger Altman observed that the larger the intake amounts were, the more the body increased its excretion rate. No silver seemed to be stored in the tissues, but the body efficiently eliminated excess silver. In light of this, it is possible to significantly extend the LOAEL and NOAEL set by the authorities, likely equivalent to thousands of years. These intake levels are based on the erroneous assumption that the body would accumulate all the silver we ingest. It’s interesting to note that the less silver the body has stored, the slower it eliminates it. This suggests that the body knows it needs to save a little for various biochemical purposes.
Be cautious with self-made products
The few cases where people are claimed to have developed argyria from colloidal silver always involve parameters that deviate from the norm. To begin with, individuals have brewed their own colloidal silver using a simple home machine, often without any control over the strength of the final product. This can result in a product containing several hundred ppm (parts per million) of silver. Salt is often added to expedite the process, creating large quantities of silver chloride. Then, these individuals may decide to consume this product in quantities equivalent to a liter or more per day. This is a product that is usually grayish and not entirely clear, as a correctly produced product should be.
When people have consumed tens of grams of silver this way over many years, they may have managed to develop a discoloration in the skin, a cosmetic side effect. It’s best to use a professionally produced commercial product that consists mostly of silver ions. This way, you know the strength and can expect stable and good results from the product. Also, make sure to use a product produced without the addition of salt, and avoid exceeding the recommended intake doses as recommended by WHO or EPA for extended periods.
Clear or yellow product?
Many online sources talk about a good colloidal silver product being golden-yellow, but this doesn’t align with reality. The coloration of the product is not actually caused by something in the liquid itself. In fact, it’s an optical filter effect that occurs when the particles become large enough to diffract light. The yellow color happens when the particles are large enough to diffract the short-wavelength blue light. The result is a kind of color filter that diffracts blue light and only allows red and green light to pass through. Red and green together make yellow – the complementary color to blue. When you have colloidal silver that shifts toward yellow, it’s a sign that you have larger particles in the liquid than might be desirable. The product’s effectiveness largely relies on the particles being as small as possible. A colorless product consists of particles so small that they don’t diffract light – and should, therefore, be more effective than a product that is yellow.
10 ppm, 20 ppm, or maybe higher?
Many people believe that the higher the ppm (parts per million) concentration in colloidal silver, the better the product. The truth is that the higher the concentration, the more likely silver ions are to collide and combine into larger – and thus less effective – silver particles. The more silver particles the solution contains, the larger the total surface area the product can generate in the battle against microorganisms. Many experts talk about a practical saturation limit at around 13 ppm, where anything above 13 ppm in strength tends to have a greater tendency to form larger particles than may be optimal. Since large particles diffract light and create an optical effect that produces a yellowish color, many products that are above 13 ppm in strength typically exhibit a yellowish hue.
Maximum daily colloidal silver intake for 80 years without issues
If we base our calculations on the safety data provided by the authorities, it becomes clear that you could take up to six teaspoons of 10 ppm (parts per million) colloidal silver daily for a whole 80 years without exceeding the entirely safe No Observed Adverse Effect Level (NOAEL) equivalent to 10 grams of silver over a lifetime. The risk level for developing argyria, as previously mentioned, starts at 25 grams of silver, the Lowest Observed Adverse Effect Level (LOAEL). In other words, you could consume 6 teaspoons a day for 200 years before getting close to levels that could only result in a minor skin discoloration.
So, what do the authorities mean when they try to convince people that even the slightest consumption of colloidal silver would turn them gray or blue? They are evidently confusing the old silver-based medicines from the past with the weak modern electro-colloidal silver. There is such a vast difference in strength between the old silver-based medicines and a modern 10 ppm colloidal silver that if you were to extrapolate a daily dose of a 300,000 ppm medicine to the consumption rate of a 10 ppm colloidal silver, that dose would last for 27 years of daily consumption. This highlights the significant differences in strength between the products.
Silver in the Ayurvedic Tradition
In India, there is a long-standing Ayurvedic tradition that advocates the consumption of silver. It is estimated that in India, people consume approximately 275,000 kg of silver every year. In India, it is common to be served a sheet of edible silver, known as ”Vark,” on desserts, pastries, and even certain main dishes. Over the thousands of years that silver has been used in this way in India, no harmful effects have been noted. Therefore, pure silver can be considered completely safe.
”A recent paper by Das et al. provides the remarkable datum that some 275,000 kg of edible metallic silver foil are consumed every year (in food) in India. No known adverse health effects have ever been recorded. This epidemiological evidence that silver as a metal is not toxic in any way needs no further comment. Further support for the obvious safety of consuming metallic silver (Ag0) is in the worldwide consumption of (so-called) silver colloids, often made at home in primitive electrochemical cells by probably some millions of citizens, again with no ill effects.” [10].
Edible Silver is Available at the Supermarket
In the Western world, there are also traditions that involve consuming pure silver. At supermarkets like ICA, you can buy silver meant to be eaten, often in unlimited quantities, typically by children. In the context of food, silver is referred to as E 174 (a food coloring) and is approved for use in any amount. Manufacturers of these so-called silver pearls include companies like Santa Maria and Dr. Oetker. The popular silver pearls sold as cake decorations consist of a sugar pearl with a coating of pure silver. Each pearl contains the equivalent of six teaspoons (300 micrograms) of a 10 ppm colloidal silver.
These edible silver pearls can be consumed by two-year-old children at a birthday party without parents or authorities showing concern. It’s like drinking 300 ml of colloidal silver.
If silver were indeed dangerous to consume, we would be witnessing harm everywhere by now. Silver is present in the food we eat and the water we drink, although in relatively small amounts for optimal bodily function. Research indicates that in recent years, the silver content in both water and food has significantly decreased. This reduction is due to the chemical fertilization, which mainly consists of potassium, nitrogen, and phosphorus. All other substances are leached from the soil by plants, and the soil eventually contains almost nothing other than potassium, nitrogen, and phosphorus after about 10 years.
Dietary Supplements = Food and Vice Versa
One can also wonder about the legislation that actually equates dietary supplements with food. According to the law, neither is supposed to have any effect on diseases or the body, as strange as this may sound. Despite the fact that the content of food, including minerals, trace elements, fatty acids, and vitamins, builds and maintains our bodies, and that a lack of these substances leads to various deficiency symptoms. In other words, the legislation perpetuates the lie that various food authorities have spread for far too many years now – ”eat a varied diet and you’ll get all the nutrients you need”… The content of minerals and trace elements in our food has decreased by nearly 90 percent in the last 100 years.
The pharmaceutical industry has managed to secure the territory of ”curing.” Only drugs, according to the legal definition, are allowed to have a physiological or metabolic effect on the body. In the case of silver pearls and colloidal silver, which were previously approved dietary supplements, we now have the strange situation where silver in silver pearls (food) is approved for sale, while silver in the form of colloidal silver is no longer allowed to be sold as food or a dietary supplement. Despite food and dietary supplements falling under the same legislation, a distinction is now made regarding the same chemical element. How can this be?
Colloidal Silver Faces Criticism in Sweden
In November 2007, the Swedish TV program ”Rapport,” during prime time, criticized Ion Silver’s product Ionosil under the headline ”Dangerous for Health and the Environment.” They claimed that the product could turn people blue, harm internal organs, induce antibiotic resistance, and pose a threat to the environment. These claims are as far from the truth as possible.
The product cannot cause argyria as it consists of pure silver in nanometer size at very low concentrations. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), one can take six daily teaspoons for life without risking any adverse effects. The product has been shown to kill antibiotic-resistant bacteria, and many women have more silver in their jewelry boxes than is used in the entire annual production of Ion Silver (less than half a kilogram), so it poses hardly any environmental danger.
Why Electro-Colloidal Silver Doesn’t Lead to the Development of Resistant Bacteria
Silver has been with us since the beginning of evolution. We have silver jewelry, we have eaten with silver utensils, our amalgam fillings contain 35 percent silver, and water and food contain silver. If silver could cause even a fraction of the resistant bacteria that antibiotics have now achieved, we would have seen this long ago.
The Swedish Institute for Communicable Disease Control (Smittskyddsinstitutet) does not agree with researchers like Melhus, who warn that widespread silver resistance could spread in society. This is according to the Swedish clothing company Haglöfs, which uses silver chloride as a bacterial inhibitor in its outdoor clothing.
Regarding the risk of resistance development, there are scientific studies showing how multi-resistant bacteria that do not respond to antibiotic treatment are effectively eliminated when silver is added in nanoparticle form. An Indian study [11] and an Iranian study [12] confirm this. The National Food Agency (Livsmedelsverket) cannot provide studies to support claims of resistance development, and they even contradict themselves on their website, stating, ”…Livsmedelsverkets uppfattning för närvarande att det saknas dokumentation för bedömning om peroral tillförsel av kolloidalt silver i kosttillskott ger upphov till antibiotikaresistens” (there is currently no documentation to assess whether oral administration of colloidal silver in dietary supplements leads to antibiotic resistance).
In the article ”The increasing use of silver-based products as antimicrobial agents: a useful development or a cause for concern?” the authors state that the risk of resistance development is low when using sufficient amounts of silver ions in treatment: ”The clinical incidence of silver resistance remains low, and emergence of resistance can be minimized if the level of silver ions released from products is high and the bactericidal activity rapid.” [13].
Silver in this form can effectively address the issues healthcare faces with resistant bacteria. Studies have shown that even MRSA, multi-resistant staphylococci, which kill 50,000 people in Europe every year, are killed within minutes using colloidal silver. It is not as some Swedish researchers claim, that silver in this form creates a lot of resistant bacterial strains because ”there is too little silver” in the product. Such statements from researchers show their limited understanding of nanotechnology and how it works. When researchers claim to have found resistant bacterial strains that do not respond to treatment with silver ions, it is because they have used silver nitrate-generated silver ions, obtained too few active silver ions to reach the bacteria, and often designed the study incorrectly.
Using electro-colloidal silver has never been shown to lead to resistant bacteria. On the contrary, there are numerous cases where silver in this form has killed antibiotic-resistant bacteria. Researchers have also seen that in the few cases of silver resistance noted, the bacteria often lose their resistance to silver in just a few generations, when the bacteria no longer need the resistance and shed this function to save energy. Few experts believe that widespread silver resistance will ever become a significant problem. All this is based on speculation. We have been in daily contact with various silver objects for hundreds of years, such as cups, jewelry, and utensils. If daily contact with silver in this form created a multitude of resistant bacteria, we would have seen this long ago…
The American expert group IMREF has compiled the reasons for perceived silver resistance development. It is a group of researchers and doctors with extensive treatment experience with colloidal silver, or as they choose to call it, silver hydrosol. They state that researchers worldwide have only studied resistance development caused by silver nitrate-based treatment solutions, never electrically generated colloidal silver [14].
They write: ”Instead, the experimental designs typically utilized silver salt compounds, which deliver poor amounts of bioactive silver. Another most common problem of these experimental designs was the inadvertent culture contamination with various salts, something which will reduce silver efficacy. The colloidal state and dynamics of living tissues are at odds with typical culture techniques and mediums, and bring about the unfortunate situation of requiring readers to compare apples to oranges.”
In a laboratory study, the company Ion Silver has shown that their product Ionosil eliminates MRSA in 4-8 minutes. They also have case studies showing that it works in the human body too. If the product had been adopted more widely, many lives could have been saved [15].
A user who personally experienced the effectiveness of colloidal silver on her MRSA wrote: ”I underwent breast cancer surgery a few years ago. They removed one breast and also the lymph nodes. Later, to be completely sure to remove all possible malignancy, I chose to have the other breast removed. That’s when hell began. An antibiotic-resistant infection developed in the wound, the hospital-acquired infection – also known as MRSA (Methicillin Resistant Staphylococcus Aureus).
Now, there were long days with constant bandage changes and wound drainage. This was combined with first one type of antibiotic, then several rounds of two different types. As soon as I finished the antibiotic courses, the wound flared up and got even worse. Some days there could be so much pus in the wound that it swelled like a balloon, and sometimes the wound would burst and spread pus all around. Eventually, I had drainage tubes put in, which was not a pleasant sight to handle. In the mornings, the tube was full of pus that had accumulated overnight, and keeping the tube open was not a pleasant task.
When I was at my worst, two good friends independently recommended that I try colloidal silver. I thought there must be a higher power behind this message coming from two different sources at the same time. So, I went to a health food store and bought a liter of Ionosil. Later, when I tried to get help with wound dressing and drainage at the hospital, they had no time for me and urged me to seek help from a doctor elsewhere. Fortunately, I managed to get an appointment for bandaging and drainage at the City Clinic in my town. I took the bottle of colloidal silver with me and demanded that the wound be washed with it – which they did, albeit quite reluctantly. They had never heard of colloidal silver.
When I returned home from the clinic, I drank a few teaspoons of colloidal silver once in the afternoon and once just before going to bed. You can imagine my surprise when I woke up the next morning. The wound, which usually protruded, full of pus, showed no signs of protrusion now. When I managed to loosen part of the bandage, I was amazed to see that it looked as good as the day before. It was as if the infection had vanished! What a relief, and all of this after just one cleansing and two rounds of a few teaspoons taken orally.”
Danish researchers examined their stock of antibiotic-resistant bacterial strains in 2007 and checked whether these strains were also resistant to silver. Out of 400 checked strains, not a single one was silver-resistant [16]. In other words, the use of silver nanoparticles could be an effective treatment for these antibiotic-resistant bacteria.
The claim that colloidal silver, or silver itself, could give rise to large amounts of silver-resistant bacteria must, therefore, be considered a gross misrepresentation, likely with economic and political repercussions. Researcher Åsa Melhus, who warned of broad silver resistance in society in 2007, has been shown to be biased. Melhus has developed a wound dressing based on birch sugar Xylitol. She has a financial interest in removing silver-based dressings from the market, in favor of her product, which she sold to Mölnlycke [17]. It was Melhus’s work that led Sweden to ban the use of many effective silver products, products that are bestsellers in most other European countries. These include silver plasters from Hansaplast and Nivea’s best-selling silver deodorant ”Silver Protect,” which is sold in most other countries around the world.
Melhus’s blatant lies about Ion Silver’s product Ionosil in 2007 led to her being awarded the 2000s Science Demon’s People’s Award the same year, an award given to those who ”in a dogmatic and unscientific way make it difficult for people to find their own paths to health” [18].
That bacteria, in exceptional cases, can develop resistance to various substances is well-known and often depends on the use of sublethal amounts of the substance in question. There is no difference whether one uses copper, mercury, or antibiotics – the issue remains.
A 10 ppm product contains only one-tenth of a gram of silver per liter. This means that a total annual consumption of 25,000 liters would use 250 grams of silver. A consumption of 50,000 liters would use 500 grams of silver, and so on. The use of the product is evenly spread throughout the country, so there are no large concentrated emissions. The quantities that seep out from the usage are on the order of millionths of a gram. Even if the emissions occurred in ion form into the sewage system, silver ions quickly bind with dirt, organic material, and most importantly, sulfur. When silver ions bind to sulfur, they form silver sulfide, which is fifteen thousand times less toxic to aquatic organisms than pure silver ions. Silver sulfide is classified as non-toxic to aquatic organisms.
The Swedish National Food Agency claims that colloidal silver could be an environmental hazard. The total amount of silver that Ion Silver uses for its annual production is less than half a kilogram – yet another proof of how little the National Food Agency familiarized themselves with the product before making statements. Ion Silver has asked the National Food Agency to go out in the media and retract their statements, but they refuse to do so. When they realized their mistake, they choose to remain silent. Criticizing a Swedish company that has sold an EU-approved dietary supplement unfairly with inaccuracies and falsehoods is apparently acceptable. This is done without even consulting the company before going public. If the authorities continue to claim that colloidal silver poses a danger to people, animals, and nature, it is, in the light of established research, nothing more than evidence of how corrupted these authorities are.
Livsmedelsverket recognized their error regarding colloidal silver.
After the broadcast in the ”Rapport” program, Ion Silver engaged in a dialogue with the National Food Agency where they managed to show the agency that they were wrong on all the points they had criticized – argyria, resistance development, and the product posing an environmental threat.
This resulted in the National Food Agency apologizing to Ion Silver for their statements being interpreted as a risk assessment of their product Ionosil. They clarified that this was never the intended message. They also readily admitted that they had never known how much silver is needed to develop argyria from colloidal silver. The agency had not made any effort to understand the dose required to develop what they had presented as the primary argument in the media. It apparently came as a complete surprise to the agency that it is completely impossible to develop argyria from the use of Ion Silver’s product.
Despite the National Food Agency acknowledging their mistake and apologizing, they refused to publicly rectify their mistake. The chief legal officer of the agency made this very clear without being able to provide a clear reason why. Moreover, they persisted in publishing grossly inaccurate information about colloidal silver on their website and continued to issue warnings about colloidal silver.
Ion Silver conducted a comprehensive review of the National Food Agency’s claims, addressed them, and published the entire review. Despite their communications with the agency, the agency refused to correct the information, stating they intended to retain it, even though the product is no longer considered a dietary supplement.
Since January 1, 2010, colloidal silver falls under the laws and regulations of the Swedish Chemicals Agency. Nevertheless, the National Food Agency continues to maintain inaccurate information about a product that has nothing to do with food. It’s as if the National Food Agency were to publish incorrect information about gasoline and acetone, substances that cannot be considered food. You can read the full review here [19].
Why are authorities trying to ban colloidal silver?
The authorities, as previously mentioned, are generally ignorant about what electrocolloidal silver actually is. They don’t understand its form and how little silver is involved. It seems that they prefer to issue warnings about the product rather than truly understanding what it is. The small amounts of silver involved, about 30-100 mg of pure silver annually, are nothing to repeatedly raise alarms about in the media. However, they continue to do so. Those who speak for the authorities often talk about silver in high doses and the wrong form. It’s like trying to ban a product like Ramlösa while claiming it’s dangerous.
One might suspect that the authorities and the media are serving the interests of big industry when they report in a biased manner, based on outright inaccuracies, in an effort to eliminate a product that, when used correctly, can save lives and significant amounts of money for society.
Skeptics remain skeptical
There are skeptics in society who claim to be skeptical about almost everything that is not presented in the form of research based on double-blind studies. Many of these skeptics do not believe that colloidal silver has any effect on microorganisms. To reach such a state of denial, one practically needs to be both deaf and blind. There is a wealth of research showing the broad effects of silver ions on fungi, viruses, bacteria, and single-celled parasites. When presenting this, skeptics often bring up arguments about the lack of double-blind studies conducted in the body.
Double-blind studies in themselves are no guarantee that the research is correctly conducted, as there is a lot of fraud and data distortion even in this type of study.
Skeptics wonder why colloidal silver has not been tested in double-blind studies. The answer to that is partly because it has traditionally been classified as a dietary supplement, and there is no one willing to finance a double-blind study because the product cannot be patented. Thus, you cannot have exclusive rights to the product’s sales for a long time.
References
[1]. Silver är ett ogiftigt mineral för däggdjursceller:
Dartmouth Toxic Metals om Silver
[2]. Rent silver är ogiftigt, silversalter är toxiska:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silver
[3]. Kolloidalt silver påverkar inte tarmens goda bakteriestammar:
http://lifesilver.com/ABL_SafetyStudies.pdf sid 32-38.
[4]. Colloids in health and disease. En sammanfattning av de behandlingskunskaper man hade 1920. Sidan 82 och framåt beskriver hur man använde kolloidalt silver på den tiden.
http://www.archive.org/download/useofcolloidsinh00searuoft/useofcolloidsinh00searuoft.pdf
[5]. Elektriska silverjoner överlägsna. Electrochemical Ag+ for preservative use: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC183190/pdf/aem00053-0060.pdf
[6]. 200.000 döda av läkemedel varje år i USA. Deadly Medicine: http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2011/01/deadly-medicine-201101
[7]. Inga dödsfall orsakade av vitaminer på 27 år: http://orthomolecular.org/resources/omns/v07n05.shtml
[8]. Colloidal Silver. Where does it go when you drink it? Roger Altman:
http://www.silver-colloids.com/Papers/AltmanStudy.pdf
[9] Den indiska traditionen med bladsilver (Vark) på mat och efterrätter: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vark
[10]. Indiska Ayurvediska traditionen att äta silver: http://www.iisc.ernet.in/currsci/oct252005/1307.pdf
[11]. Bactericidal activity of combinations of Silver–Water dispersion: http://www.ihsite.com/user/silver%20water%20dispersion%5D.pdf
[12]. Synthesis and characterization of silver nano particles for antibacterial activity: http://www.ijnd.ir/doc/2010-v1-i2/2010-V1-I2-4.pdf
[13]. Ingen överhängande risk för silveresistens om man använder effektiva produkter: http://jac.oxfordjournals.org/content/59/4/587.full.pdf+html
[14]. Sammanställning av de verkliga orsakerna bakom upplevd silveresistens: http://www.imref.org/articles/pdfs/Microbial_MultiDrug_Resistance_(MDR)_And_Oligodynamic_Silver.pdf
[15] Study of the Antibacterial Efficacy of Ionosil vs. MRSA:
http://ion-silver.com/docs/Inhibition%20of%20Staph%20aureus%20with%20Ionosil.pdf
[16]. Dansk genomgång av antibiotikaresistenta stammar visar ingen silverresistens:
http://ing.dk/artikel/83533
[17]. Melhus patent på Xylitolbaserad kompress: http://www.wipo.int/pctdb/en/wo.jsp?wo=2005058381
[18] Melhus utsedd till Årets Folkvätte 2007 för lögner kring det kolloidala silvret Ionosil:
http://ion-silver.com/docs/Melhus%202007%20-%202000-talets%20Vetenskap.pdf
[19]. Genomgång av Livsmedelsverkets uppenbart felaktiga syn på kolloidalt silver:
http://www.ion-silver.com/livsfel.htm
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The article talks of Paul Karason as if he is living. He passed away 23rd September 2013. You know you only have to make an obvious typo and they do their best to discredit an article.
Great article.