Is it Safe to Use Colloidal Silver? What You Need to Know…
For centuries, the use of colloidal silver has fascinated and intrigued health enthusiasts seeking natural remedies…but is colloidal silver safe to use? Is there any research or documentation that vouches for the safety of colloidal silver? The answer is a resounding “yes,”!
I’ve used colloidal silver daily for well over 20 years now, and have never had a single safety issue with it. Instead, it’s helped keep me on my feet, active and relatively infection-free, even though all of these years I’ve suffered from a chronic degenerative infectious disease known as Chronic Fatigue Immune Deficiency Syndrome, which is why I started using colloidal silver in the first place.
Yet, it’s not solely based on personal experiences. Below, you’ll discover several studies documenting the safety of colloidal silver. Here’s what you need to know…
Hi, Steve Barwick here, for The Silver Edge…
Probably one of the top questions I get is this: “Is colloidal silver safe to use?” The simple answer is, “Yes, when used appropriately and not abusively.” But what about actual research?
In 2014, American Biotech Labs released what was believed to be the first-ever human ingestion safety study on a colloidal silver supplement.
The published abstract for the study states that ingestion of the patented ABL nanosilver product showed no negative effects on any tested system in the body.
One of the charges commonly laid against colloidal silver supplements by critics and natural health skeptics is that there have been no “double-blind, placebo-controlled human ingestion studies” conducted on the substance.
Well, one has and did so several years ago.
American Biotech Labs released the preliminary data from a double-blind, placebo-controlled cross-over phase study conducted by researchers at the University of Utah, at Salt Lake City.
Study Details
In the study, titled An In Vivo Human Time-Exposure Investigation of a Commercial Silver Nano-Particle Solution, healthy volunteer subjects ingested American Biotech Labs 10 ppm colloidal silver solution for periods of three days, seven days and 14 days.
There were 36 subjects in all, 12 per each of the three time exposures studied.
The study subjects took one tablespoon of the American Biotech Labs colloidal silver product per day (15 mL/day) for their assigned period.
Afterwards, at the end of each phase, they underwent extensive tests for:
- Metabolic rate
- Blood and platelet count
- Urinalysis
- Sputum hyper-responsiveness and inflammation evaluation
- Physical examinations
- Vital sign measurements
Plus, the researchers conducted magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) examinations of the chest and abdomen at baseline, and at the end of each phase.
According to the study authors:
“No clinically important changes in any metabolic, hematologic, or urinalysis measure identified were determined.
No morphological (or structural) changes were detected in the lungs, heart (cardiac function) or abdominal organs.
No changes were noted in sputum reactive oxygen species or in pro-inflammatory cytokines.”
Important Data
These results are important, because critics often charge that colloidal silver ingestion harms blood cells, kidney function or function of other organs in the body.
And some critics even falsely charge that ingestion of colloidal silver boosts the body’s production of potentially dangerous free radicals and inflammatory cytokines.
Of course, in previous in vitro clinical studies (i.e., laboratory test-tube studies), colloidal silver has actually been demonstrated to protect human nervous system cells from harm.
Colloidal silver has also been demonstrated in in vitro clinical studies to prevent blood clots without causing harm to red blood cells.
What’s more, in another in vitro clinical study, researchers found that instead of colloidal silver causing an increase in pro-inflammatory cytokines, it actually reduced them.
And on page 235 of The Ultimate Colloidal Silver Manual, I write extensively about an in vitro clinical study demonstrating silver’s ability to significantly quench free radical activity in brain cells, rather than cause it as critics so often charge.
Finally, a 2011 oral ingestion study and a 2012 oral ingestion study, both using animals, demonstrated that even relatively high doses of silver nanoparticles taken over short periods of time caused no mortality or acute toxic signs in the animals tested.
So the shrill cries of the skeptics, critics and colloidal silver naysayers remain completely unfounded to date.
Now, the positive results determined by this University of Utah human ingestion study constitute another milestone in negating the hyperbolic accusations of the critics of colloidal silver.
As the study authors conclude:
“In-vivo oral exposure of a commercial 10-ppm silver nano-particle solution over 3, 7, and 14-day exposures does not exhibit clinically important changes in metabolic, hematologic, urine, vital sign changes, physical findings or imaging changes visualized by MRI.
Further study of increasing time-exposure, dose, and additional organ systems, including cytochrome P-450 enzymes, is warranted.”
In short, this first preliminary study demonstrated that the daily consumption of the colloidal silver product tested was safe for the time exposures studied, and indicates that longer-term human ingestion studies need to be conducted for further insight.
No Silver Deposition
As a prelim to the human ingestion study, Keith Moeller, a managing director at American Biotech Labs who has been taking small amounts of colloidal silver almost daily for over 15 years, volunteered to be checked for silver deposition in his body.
The researchers did an array of blood tests, as well as a full-body MRI scan that took nearly two hours while they checked each organ looking for evidence of silver deposition in his body.
No silver residue was found anywhere in Moeller’s system. No harm to his bodily functions was discovered. No abnormalities were found.
In short, properly made colloidal silver used responsibly in small daily amounts appears to be abundantly safe even over the long term.
Colloidal Silver Considered Safe
For Commercial Sales and Use
Colloidal silver is sold in just about every health food store in America, and throughout Canada and Mexico, parts of Europe as well as by tens of thousands of online vendors worldwide.
Tens of millions of people use it annually. And its safety profile is considered to be similar to any other nutritional supplement. If used as directed, as a mineral supplement, it’s generally considered safe. In fact, it has GRAS status with the FDA, meaning it’s considered to be “Generally Recognized as Safe.”
What’s more, throughout Europe preparations of silver (generally in the form of colloidal silver) are used worldwide as a water disinfectant, to help prevent microbial contamination. For example:
- It’s widely used on yachts and cruise ships throughout Europe to help disinfect the drinking water.
- It’s been used in swimming pools (see also here) and hot tubs to help keep them sparkling fresh and germ-free.
- It’s also been used in municipal drinking water systems to reduce excessively high microbial counts.
- And silver has even been used by the NASA and Russian space programs to help prevent contamination of the water supply, and NASA is also said to be once again returning to the use of colloidal silver for disinfection of the drinking water in manned space flights.
What’s more, it’s widely used as a water disinfectant in homes throughout countries like Mexico and others, as evidenced by the following news report from The Silver Institute, an organization that reports on the many uses of silver worldwide:
“Since 1955, with the approval of the Ministry of Health of Mexico, Microdyn, a silver colloid, with a particle size of about 2 nanometers, has been used to provide healthful water for its citizens.
‘A few drops of Microdyn available in small bottles provides sufficient silver to disinfect clear drinking water in about 10 minutes,’ states Luis Arizcorreta Buchholz, president of Roland de Mexico, S.A, de C.V, Mexico D.E, Mexico.
‘It’s a convenient disinfectant for individual use in areas wherever tap water is suspect…Its use is credited with a dramatic improvement in the health of the residents of the town of Cruz Azul, Lagunas, Oaxaca, Mexico, who for years had suffered rampant gastroenteritis.
The introduction of a Microdyn coating to the town’s water supply cisterns in 1977 made the difference. Other local water supply systems treated with Microdyn achieved similar results.”
Potters for Peace, as well as other organizations that help provide safe drinking water in developing nations, have been infusing colloidal silver into ceramic water filters for years – this, as a means of giving poor people in remote villages where there’s no running water, access to clean, safe water disinfected of any potentially harmful microbes.
And for decades here in North America a number of companies have manufactured and sold home water filters infused with colloidal silver, to help keep germs and other potentially harmful microbes from fouling the water supply.
The list goes on and on, but I think you get the point: Colloidal silver has been used in numerous ways, widely – and quite safely – for decades.
What Researchers Say
When the Dartmouth University researchers studied silver in order to determine whether or not it was safe or toxic in humans, this is what they concluded:
“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, however. Over 99 percent is readily excreted from the body.
Is silver harmful to humans? 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.”
— Dartmouth University Toxic Metals Research Program
Or as Dr. Herbert Slavin, M.D., Director of the Institute of Advanced Medicine in Lauderhill Florida has put it:
“Few things in life are as cut-and-dried as the fact that silver is completely safe when used within normal limits…Ionic silver is entirely non-toxic to the body.”
And as Dr. Jeffrey Blumer, M.D., Ph.D., director of the Center for Drug Research and former director of the Greater Cleveland Poison Control Center has stated:
“Common substances like table salt and aspirin are harmless with normal use, but excessive intake can become toxic and even life-threatening. With normal responsible usage, silver supplements are entirely harmless to humans.”
As Byron Richards, CCN (Board Certified Clinical Nutritionist), a charter member of the International Association of Clinical Nutritionists has stated:
“…the antibiotic properties of silver are quite potent – and the risk to human health in terms of toxicity is negligible. [Silver has] a far better risk/benefit profile than commonly used antibiotics.”
And as Dr. Ron Leavitt, Ph.D., Professor of Microbiology at Brigham Young University has stated, regarding his own clinical studies of colloidal silver:
“The data suggests that with the low toxicity associated with colloidal silver, in general, and the broad spectrum of antimicrobial activity of this colloidal silver preparation, this preparation may be effectively used as an alternative to antibiotics.”
Of course, no substance on the face of the earth is completely safe if used abusively. Even common nutritional supplements can be harmful when used outside of the bounds of common sense. For example:
- Abusive use of iron supplements can, over long periods of time, result in cirrhosis of the liver and heart failure.
- Abusive use of calcium over long periods of time can result in kidney malfunction, calcification of soft tissue within the body, cellular toxicity and impaired immune function.
- Abusive use of vitamin A over long periods of time can result in muscle pain, fatigue, irritability, depression, schizophrenia, fever, liver damage and anemia.
- Abusive use of selenium over long periods of time can result in nervous system damage.
None of those side effects justify being afraid to use the substances mentioned. Why? Because the key phrase involved in each one is “abusive use.” When used in moderation, these substances are not only benign but extremely beneficial to one’s health and well-being. But when used to dramatic excess, they can cause potentially serious health consequences if the abusive use continues over long periods of time.
It’s exactly the same with colloidal silver. If you use it in moderation and with common sense, it’s generally considered to be completely harmless. Thousands of experiential accounts (and tens of millions of bottles of colloidal silver sold annually, worldwide) suggest you can use it on a regular daily basis in small amounts. Or you can use it from time to time on a strictly “as needed” basis in somewhat larger amounts.
But what you cannot do is use it abusively, every single day, for months and years on end, because like any other substance, such abusive use can result in problems rather than benefits.
To learn more about colloidal silver safety, along with answers to some of the false charges leveled against colloidal silver from time to time, see the following articles:
The Bottom Line:
Widely Used With Amazing Safety!
The bottom line is that hundreds of thousands of oral colloidal silver doses are used every month in the United States with no significant adverse effects or detrimental consequences.
A double-blind, placebo-controlled, crossover phase study has demonstrated conclusively what’s already been demonstrated for the past 60-plus years in uncountable numbers of real-life situations, i.e.:
Colloidal silver when properly made and responsibly used has one of the safest toxicological profiles of any nutritional supplement.
In contrast, prescription drugs, even when properly used, result in an average of 106,000 deaths per year, plus untold adverse reactions and side effects, according to the Journal of the American Medical Association.
While the critics ignore the above data and tout the very small handful of cases in which negative effects were attributed to colloidal silver after it was used abusively over long periods of time, they will now have to admit that responsible use of colloidal silver has no serious clinically discernible negative consequences.
Learn more about colloidal silver and its usage by clicking the link in this sentence.
Share Your Experiences with Using Colloidal Silver Safely…
Have you used colloidal silver successfully and safely? We’d love to hear about it! If you haven’t already, please join the Colloidal Silver Secrets Group on Facebook and let us know your story!
Make Your Own High-Quality Colloidal Silver for Pennies!
Typical health food store prices for colloidal silver can range from $20 to $30 for a tiny, four-ounce bottle.
But with a brand new Micro-Particle Colloidal Silver Generator from The Silver Edge, you can make your own safe, pure, high-quality micro-particle colloidal silver for about 36 cents a quart! In other words, you can make it at actual cost, just like the big colloidal silver bottlers do.
Compared to typical health food store prices, your first two one-quart batches literally pay for the entire cost of your new generator! Do you know of any other health product that literally pays for itself the very first few times you use it? The savings are absolutely astonishing!
In fact, by making your own high-quality colloidal silver with a brand new Micro-Particle Colloidal Silver Generator from The Silver Edge, you’ll be as close to having FREE colloidal silver as you can get, and for the rest of your life!
You’ll never have to pay those exorbitant health food store prices again!
The new Micro-Particle Colloidal Silver Generator is now the world’s #1 best-selling colloidal silver generator. Here are just a few reasons why you should own one…
- It pays for itself after your very first batch or two – your total cost to make your first one-quart batch is about 36 cents, compared to the $240 you’d pay at a health food store if you bought an equivalent amount (i.e., eight of those little 4-ounce bottles they normally sell for $30 apiece)!
- Safe, simple to operate…No special skills needed…You just set the handy timer, plug it in, walk away, and three hours later you have a perfect batch of therapeutic quality micro-particle colloidal silver…every time! Here’s a short pictorial demonstrating how astonishingly easy it is to use a new Micro-Particle Colloidal Silver Generator from The Silver Edge:
- Produces uncommonly small silver micro-particles as low as .8 nm. That’s a fraction of a single nanometer. Compare that to health food store colloidal silver which can contain silver particles as large as 200 nm to 1,000 nm (or even larger), and you’ll see why micro-particle colloidal silver is the very best there is! Smaller particles mean your body can absorb and utilize up to 99% of the colloidal silver you take, compared to maybe 30% or 40% with many health food store brands!
- Runs on standard household electricity, but uses less power than a tiny Christmas tree bulb – you won’t even see a blip on your electric bill!
- Produces uniform, crystal clear batches every single time that store for months, or even years, without losing potency!
- Cannot produce silver chloride or unsafe substances – you get pure, therapeutic-quality micro-particle colloidal silver every time!
The Bottom Line…
With a high-quality Micro-Particle Colloidal Silver Generator from The Silver Edge, you’ll never again have to pay exorbitant health food store or internet vendor prices for high-quality colloidal silver!
Indeed, your first batch or two will indeed completely pay for the entire cost of your generator, compared to health food store prices!
What’s more, you’ll be able to give it away FREE to family members, friends and neighbors, because you’ll be making it – literally – for only a few pennies per batch!
Simply click on this link to learn more about this phenomenal new breakthrough in colloidal silver-making technology, including our current, time-limited, money-saving offers that can save you up to $100 if you act quickly and decisively!
Meanwhile, I’ll be back next week with another insightful article on colloidal silver….
Yours for the safe, sane and responsible use of colloidal silver,
Steve Barwick, author
The Ultimate Colloidal Silver Manual
Helpful Links:
FREE Colloidal Silver Safe Dosage Report
Colloidal Silver Secrets Group on Facebook
Make Your Own Colloidal Silver for Pennies
.9999 Pure Silver Wire for Making Colloidal Silver
Important Note and Disclaimer: The contents of this Ezine have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. Information conveyed herein is from sources deemed to be accurate and reliable, but no guarantee can be made in regards to the accuracy and reliability thereof. The author, Steve Barwick, is a natural health journalist with over 30 years of experience writing professionally about natural health topics. He is not a doctor. Therefore, nothing stated in this Ezine should be construed as prescriptive in nature, nor is any part of this Ezine meant to be considered a substitute for professional medical advice. Nothing reported herein is intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease. The author is simply reporting in journalistic fashion what he has learned during the past 17 years of journalistic research into colloidal silver and its usage. Therefore, the information and data presented should be considered for informational purposes only and approached with caution. Readers should verify for themselves, and to their own satisfaction, from other knowledgeable sources such as their doctor, the accuracy and reliability of all reports, ideas, conclusions, comments, and opinions stated herein. All important health care decisions should be made under the guidance and direction of a legitimate, knowledgeable and experienced health care professional. Readers are solely responsible for their choices. The author and publisher disclaim responsibility and/or liability for any loss or hardship that may be incurred as a result of the use or application of any information included in this Ezine.
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