From: ((Steven B. Harris))
Subject: Re: <<<Our Mightiest Germ Fighter!!>>>
Date: 12 May 1995
Newsgroups: misc.health.alternative

In <3oudsg$1qe@ixnews3.ix.netcom.com> nanny@ix.netcom.com (NANCY
MCKNABB) writes:

>                        COLLOIDAL SILVER
>
>	            THE UNIVERSAL ANTIBIOTIC
>
>SILVER IS ONE OF THE MOST UNIVERSAL ANTIBIOTIC SUBSTANCES
>KNOWN. SILVER IS AS EFFECTIVE AS POWERFUL CHEMICAL
>DISINFECTANTS AND IS RELATIVELY HARMLESS.


There used to be a silver-containing tonic called Argyrol.  People who
drank it for years eventually developed silver crystals under their
skin, of just the right size to absorb yellow light and give them a
lovely purple-colored hide.  Permanently.  I once saw an Argyrol victim
in 1984, and she was still a delicate violet color, decades after the
fact.  I wonder how your product compares.

I'm also, in reading your message, reminded of the guy who developed the
most wonderful glue in in the world, but couldn't sell it because nobody
could get the cap off the bottles it came in.  This silver stuff of
yours kills 650 species of bacteria, you say, far more than any
antibiotic, and yet-- it doesn't upset the delicate friendly flora of
the gut, which doctors always do with those horrid antibiotics? Pardon,
but this is not credible, even on the face of it.

Where are the studies showing that YOUR product, in YOUR concentration,
kills germs?  Where are the studies showing that it gets absorbed from
the gut at all?  And if it does, how come it doesn't turn you those
lovely purple silver-grain colors of exposed black and white
photo-sensitive paper?

Finally, what makes you think you can advertize on the Internet?


                                           Steve Harris, M.D.

P.S.  The prestigeous journal is called the Lancet, not the Lancelot.
<g>.

From: sbharris@ix.netcom.com (Steven B. Harris )
Subject: Re: answer to dyer re: colloidal silver
Date: 30 Jul 1995

In <3vgrl4$rgi@ixnews2.ix.netcom.com> dedi@ix.netcom.com (JAY KIMBALL )
writes:

>A highly potent form of Colloidal Silver was developed about three
>years ago by a pharmaceutical company that was stable, no discoloring,
>and extremely effective in treating viral, fungal, and bacterial
>infections while proving to be non-toxic with negligible to no side
>effects.  Five universities testing this company's Mild Silver Protein
>produced the following results:  inhibited the replication of HIV,
>killed the spirochetes in Lyme's Disease, inhibited or killed every
>bacteria and virus tested against it, while inhibiting and killing
>candida, thrush, yeast and every fungi tested against it.

So what?  If these tests were done in a dish (which I'm sure they were)
I can do the same thing with very diluted Clorox (which can also be
drunk, used for swimming pools, etc).  But chlorine is not an
antibiotic.  Swimming pool water may kill HIV very well, but if you
have AIDS it won't do you a bit of good to drink swimming pool water.
It won't even kill many bacteria in your gut, let alone anywhere else
in your body.  Silver solutions, at best, are more like swimming pool
water than they are like penicillin.

>> Testing so far indicates this product may be the best antibiotic
>>ever developed by man.

  And THAT is pure BS.  Here you depart totally from the truth.  The
best antibiotic ever developed by man which which kills every germ--
but when you drink it, it doesn't even change your GI normal flora
enough to give you diarrhea, as plain old ampicillin often does?  Tell
us another whopper!

>Since the special formulation of Mild Silver Protein was developed
>almost three years ago,  proven in trail use,

Yeah?  Secret trials, or are they published in a scientific journal
somewhere?

>the news got out to every Tom, Dick, and Harry which in turn tried to
>duplicate that pharmaceutical company's product using the name Colloidal
>Silver or similar, however all were unsuccessful and many manufactures
>deliberately misled public users for the FAST BUCK.

  Not you, of course.  You've got the GENUINE snake oil.

>  Some manufactures
>were in such a hurry to develope any silver product that they produced
>oce potentially dangerous products as testing so far has revealed.
>>To be fully informed, and to correct your mis-statements, I would
>suggest you contact the Silver Institute in Wayne, PA at 610-254-9652
>or CERI in Menlo Park, CA at 415-321-2374, as they have been privy to
>the results of ongoing testing.

   To be privy to results of real science you read peer-reviewed
journals, not hype from product institutes.

>In fact you may wish to subscribe to CERI to be well informed regarding
>up to date legitimate alternatives, as we have found their publications
>to be ethical, legitimate, extremely accurate, and the best publcation in
>the U.S. regarding alternative products they have completed research on.

  "The best journal on alternative products" is sort of like the world
midget boxing champion.  If you think any of these things are real,
prove that they are real in the standard and accepted ways.  Infect
some animals, cure them with your product in a controled way, and
publish in a respected place.  Don't get on the net with multimarketing
drivel.

>It is best left to the experts when informing anyone of a medicinal
>effect of a product.  The information you gave was without proper
>knowledge, and in essence incorrect, and could reflect in lives or the
>quality of lives in others.

The experts are pharmacologists and medical scientists.  They publish
in peer reviewed journals.

>Knowledgeable people in the medical field know the treatment and cures
>for most terminal diseases are here now, however, the Pharmaceutical
>Division of the FDA restricts not only the information from the public
>regarding products, devices and procedures, it attacks developers with
>the FDA Office of Criminal Investigation (OCI) staffed with ex secret
>service personnel and puts the majority of researchers, developers, and
>practioners out of business.

Ah, the great conspiracy theory rides again!  The secret cancer cure
suppressed with cold fusion and the 100 mph carburator, the Dean drive,
and the secret of free energy.

>Someday, if and when we regain our Constitutional Rights, the
>atrocities against humanity committed by the FDA may be revealed.
>In the meantime, until we regain Constitutional Rights (emphasis on
>1st Amendment), unimformed people such as you, mistaking facts, pose
>an additional danger that our dictatorial FDA manifested by the
>restriction of Constitutional Rights.

 Gee, after I took my hand off my heart and wiped my eyes, I had to
reconsider that the evils of the FDA are indirect response to people
like YOU, who have not a clue as to what science is, or how it works,
and who would sell anybody anything, on the basis of a testamonial
(much like a religious testimony, save that money changes hands
sooner).  I don't like the FDA.  But YOU and your ilk gave it to us,
and I like you less.

                                           Steve Harris

From: sbharris@ix.netcom.com (Steven B. Harris )
Subject: Re: Answer to S.B. Harris  RE: MILD SILVER PROTEIN
Date: 31 Jul 1995

In <3vhid1$2jm@ixnews3.ix.netcom.com> dedi@ix.netcom.com (JAY KIMBALL )
writes:

>Your vehement missive in retaliation to the truth indicates you
>are aligned with the establishment.

On this question, as it happens, yes.  On a great many others, no.

>If you have any first hand knowledge at all, you know that after a
>product has been developed, completed its toxicity testing and in
>vitro testing, human studies are started

NO!  False.  Before you get to humans, in vivo studies are done with
animal models.  For antibiotics, you need to show that infections can be
cured in lab animals.  This is not very expensive.  You find me a couple
of good studies in which infections are cured in lab animals with oral
doses of silver, and then we'll talk.

> and from there it may
>take six to ten years and a few hundred million dolla rs to finish
>up.  From there it may take one to two years to get the trial
>studies published.  So from the time a product is developed until
>the public is informed, could take eight to twelve years.  If only
>the information were published regarding toxicity and in vitro
>testing  could well be four to six years.  You and the
>establishment would like people to die in the meantime.

People die from using ineffective products instead of something already
proven, too.  There is no royal road to medical knowledge.  You cannot
simply decide that you know the answers before the studies have been
done.  There must be thousands of antibiotics and antivirals which kill
things fine in glass dishes, but don't work orally due to problems with
absorption.  Many are known from standard medicine: gentimicin,
tobramycin, amikacin, vancomycin, mupirocin, all of the 3rd generation
cephalosporins but Suprax (if you really insist that it's a 3rd
generation drug), and so on and so on.  The kill bacteria great, but as
pills they are worthless.

>Your theory of Clorox is stupid as are most of the rest of your
>remarks.

Explain, please.  We shall see which of us is stupid.

>There are many substances that Kill HIV and also kill the person.

And there are substances that kill HIV and won't kill the person:
swimming pool water is one.  But it is not an effective treatment.
Neither is silver.

>What I stated in my answer to Dyer is the facts and I left quite a
>bit out such as non-toxic with no adverse side effects revealed in
>over two years of testing.

So what?  At best, that only means people are wasting money without
being harmed.  At worst, they take this stuff when they should be
seeking some more effective means of cure.

>You are obviously ignorant regarding ongoing testing regarding
>silver and you are more ignorant by making statements without
>current knowledge.  I wouldn't be a bit surprised if your income
>wasn't derived directly or indirectly from our government.

You'd lose that bet.  My income now is from writing and being a private
medical consultant (soon to be private practice again, after a move to
a new state).

>The real detriment to our medical society are people like you, who
>know a little, quote outdated clinical trails, think you know it
>all, haven't a clue what 's going on in current research and
>trails while indirectly causing loss of life along with l oss of
>quality of life by ludicrous statements.
>I can back up any statement I make.

Okay-- cite some papers, and I'll track them down.  Don't blame me if
you look foolish after I do: I here give fair warning at what is going
to happen.

>  I believe you on the other
> hand are apt at degrading people with words, with little
> knowledge of fact, to the detriment of the public that is sick
> and dying when the products and procedures are here that can
> treat most every terminal disease.

The detriment to the public is hucksters selling patent medicines like
you.  You are no different than some bozo hawking royal jelly, laetrile,
powdered deer antler, or Granny Hicks' secret herbal heal-all.   What
makes you think medicine and biology is that easy?  Where the devil did
you get YOUR education, that they taught you that?

>People like you belong seen but  not heard, as your ignorance can
>dramatically effect people's lives.

Ditto for you.  A little knowledge may be a dangerous thing, but no
knowledge and a lot of ego can be far worse.

                                        Steve Harris, M.D.

Newsgroups: sci.med.pharmacy
Subject: Re: Any Advice?  Mom and Silver Colloids
From: dyer@spdcc.com (Steve Dyer)
Date: Tue, 06 Jul 1999 05:59:08 GMT

In article <rVdg3.835$ih6.40968@dfiatx1-snr1.gtei.net>,
Cole <cole448@yahoo.com> wrote:
   >After living with chronic pain for years, my 60+ mom has run across the
   >hoards of Internet ads for Silver Colloids generators as a natural cure-all.
   >Local pharmacist wont offer an opinion. She lives in a remote area and I am
   >worried whether this self-treatment could be harmful or toxic. I seriously
   >doubt the medical benefit but can find no independant facts to tell her.

It is a shame that your local pharmacist is either ignorant or unwilling
to exercise his or her professional responsibilities here.

This is an endless, perennial debate on sci.med and misc.health.alternative
between MLMers and other pre-scientific yahoos and people who have an
understanding of the risks in unsupervised self-medication with obsolete
silver compounds; search for "silver" in the subject field for these
newsgroups using DejaNews (www.deja.com).

If these "silver colloid generators" produce any significant amount of
silver or silver ions in the aliquot she then medicates herself with,
she stands a strong chance of continuing to suffer from chronic pain
AND turning gray.  Look up "argyria" in MEDLINE: www.nlm.nih.gov.

Here's something I posted in 1994 to sci.med, sci.med.pharmacy
and misc.health.alternative (nothing new is ever discussed in
these forums):

Here are two references, and several more that you can look up:

Goodman and Gilman, _The Pharmacological Basis of Therapeutics_,
4th ed., 1970, p. 968-969.  Later edition of this textbook do not
go into as much detail, since even by 1970, the use of colloidal
silver as an antiseptic was all but obsolete.  One wonders if next
year's edition (they come out like clockwork every 5 years) will
be forced to address this topic again, with the irresponsible
promotion of "colloidal silver" by pyramid marketeers and gnuage
hucksters to ignorant sheep as an alternative to antibiotics.

                Minute amounts of silver are ingested daily, due to the
        wide use of this metal in eating utensils, and a portion is
        absorbed.  It has been demonstrated that silver gradually
        accumulates in the body and in the later decades of life
        reaches an appreciable concentration.  High concentrations of
        silver in the tissues, however, occurs only after the careless
        administration of silver-containing medicinals.  However,
        systemic effects do not follow absorption.  The absorbed silver
        is widely distributed in the body, especially in the
        subepithelial portions of the skin, and large amounts can
        impart to the skin a characteristic bluish pigmentation.  This
        pigmented condition is known as _argyria_.  The hue may range
        from gray to one suggesting marked cyanosis.  Part of the
        pigment may be silver sulfide, but is also partly metallic
        silver, which results from the reduction of silver in the
        tissues.  As in a photographic emulsion, the reduction is
        facilitated by light, and the pigmentation is accentuated by
        exposure to light.  Expecially those portions of the skin
        exposed to light may become discolored.  However, the first
        sign of argyria may be a slate-blue "silver line" in the
        gingival margins next to the teeth.  Argyria can be readily
        diagnosed and differentiated from other forms of pigmentation
        by direct illumination and dark-field examination of biopsied
        portions of skin.  The silver can be seen in the elastic fibers
        of the cutis, the connective tissue sheaths about the sebaceous
        glands and hair follicles, and the cutaneous vessels, muscles
        and nerves.  It is usually thought that the silver is deposited
        intra-cellularly.  However, Boersma and Baker (1948) claim
        that dark-field illumination causes extracellular deposits to
        appear as intracellular ones; they report silver to be
        deposited extra-cellularly, mainly in elastic fibers.

                The eye is particularly prone to manifest pigmentation from
        silver, the color ranging from a light bluish-gray to a brownish-
        black.  The ocular distribution of silver has been studied in only
        a few human cases; following oral administration in rats, the metal
        is found in highest concentration in certain portions of the
        choroid and ciliary body.  Only a few granules appear in the
        conjunctiva, cornea and sclera, and none is present in the lens,
        iris or retina.  The discoloration may appear after systemic or
        local administration and is often the first sign of argyria.  If
        silver compounds are being applied locally, ulceration of the
        cornea increases the possibility of pigmentation.  Clinical cases
        are on record in which pigmentation was observed within 10 days.

                Argyria can result either from industrial exposure to
        silver or to medication.  Despite the claims of some manufacturers
        that colloidal silver preparations are harmless and can be taken
        orally without impunity, many cases of argyria have resulted from
        their use.  Even the continuous application of silver compounds to
        the mucous membranes of the nose may result in swallowing of
        sufficient metal to cause cutaneous pigmentation.  The current [sic]
        use of silver nitrate in the treatment of burns may be expected to
        cause some cases of argyria.  Unfortunately, even if medication is
        immediately stopped upon its development, there is no guarantee
        that further pigmentation may not occur.

                The only injury sustained in argyria is a cosmetic one, but
        it remains for life.  The silver pigment is soluble in sodium thio-
        sulfate, but this agent is effective only in high concentrations.
        Successful treatment of argyria is rare, and requires the laborious
        intradermal injection of the entire involved area with 6% thio-
        sulfate solution and 1% potassium ferrocyanide solution.
        Dimercaprol has been shown to be ineffective; this is not
        unexpected, since the pigment is mostly free silver.

                The problem of argyria and the pharmacology of silver have
        been extensively reviewed by Hill and Pillsbury (1939).

In Casarett and Doull's _Toxicology_, 3rd. ed., (1986), chapter 19, "Toxic
Effects of Metals", p. 625, on silver:

                Industrial argyria, a chronic occupational disease, has two
        forms, local and generalized.  The local forms involves the
        formation of gray-blue patches on the skin, or may manifest itself
        in the conjunctiva of the eye.  In generalized argyria, the skin
        shows widespread pigmentation, often spreading from the face to
        most uncovered parts of the body.  In some cases, the skin may
        become black with a metallic luster.  The eyes may be affected to
        such a point that the lens and vision are disturbed.  The
        respiratory tract may also be affected in severe cases.
                Large oral doses of silver nitrate cause severe gastro-
        intestinal irritation due to its caustic action.  Lesions of the
        kidneys and lungs and the possibility of arteriosclerosis have been
        attributed to both industrial and medicinal exposures.  Large doses
        of colloidal silver administered intravenously to animals produced
        death due to pulmonary edema and congestion.  Hemolysis and
        resulting bone marrow hyperplasia have been reported.  Chronic
        bronchitis has also been reported to result from medicinal use of
        colloidal silver (Browning, 1969; Luckey, et. al., 1975.)


Boersma, D., and Baker, D.L., Sites of deposition of silver in argyria.
        _Archs Derm. Syph._, 1948, 57, 1009-1012.

Browning, E.: _Toxicity of Industrial Metals_, 2nd ed., Butterworths,
        London, 1969.

Granstein, R.D., and Sober, A.J.: Drug and heavy metal induced hyper-
        pigmentation.  In Marzulli, F.N., and Maibach, H.I. (eds.):
        _Dermatotoxicology_, 2nd ed.  Hemispheres Publishing Co.,
        Washington, D.C., 1983.

Hill, W. R., and Pillsbury, D. M., _Argyria: the Pharmacology of Silver_.
        The Willians & Wilkins Co., Baltimore, 1939.

Luckey, T.D., Venugopal, B., and Hutcheson, D.: _Heavy Metal Toxicity
        Safety and Hormonology_.  Academic Press, Inc., New York, 1975.

--
Steve Dyer
dyer@ursa-major.spdcc.com