Some people asked for references: 1. Amount of silver to cause argyria. Studies over the years vary because of the difficulty of knowing the exact dose taken, how much Ag+ is available for reaction and the exact form of the silver. It is always ionic silver - silver salts - not silver metal. There are no reports that I know of where silver metal has caused systemic argyria. (Plenty of reports of local argyria - silver earrings, silversmiths, amalgams mixed wrongly.)
Latest ref is The Lancet, 351, March 28, 1998, p960. 'The minimum oral dosage necessary to cause systemic argyria has been estimated to be about 25 to 30 gm over 6 months. In our patient we calculate his silver intake to be about 55gm.' 2. FDA recommended daily doses of silver, silver in mushrooms and foods etc see Clinical Toxicology, 34(1), 119-126, 1996, Silver Products for Medical Indications: Risk-Benefit Assessment. Written by two MD's at the FDA. Good paper. 3. I stress again that when these (and other) papers say 'silver' they mean ionic silver, not metallic silver. This is assumed. Beware of quack sites which try to blurr one into the other by talking about metal particles of a few atoms etc 4. 'Quack'. I am so used to calling non-medical cures quack cures that I am surprised to be pulled up on it. Maybe 'alt-med' is a less loaded term. I will use alt-med in future recognising that some of the alt-med people regards some of the other alt-med companies as quacks. peter crowcroft http://kitsrus.com/pheo.html -- The silver-list is a moderated forum for discussion of colloidal silver. To join or quit silver-list or silver-digest send an e-mail message to: [email protected] -or- [email protected] with the word subscribe or unsubscribe in the SUBJECT line. To post, address your message to: [email protected] List maintainer: Mike Devour <[email protected]>
