Mercury Toxicity
http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j214/chickie1968/Car.jpg So, I posted that on an ezboard I am a member of and one of the other members wrote this. I'd love to know what you all think. I thought it was an interesting thought..........
Yes, fish are high in mercury, but studies (i'm told, haven't looked it up myself) show that it is the form of mercury that the human body doesn't retain. There are many different forms of mercury and i believe some forms have been in the ocean in higher quantities since before pollution. So why would the US gov spend so much time warning us away from fish? Becuase they are diverting attention from the number one source of mercury toxicity: the air we breathe. Tons and tons of mercury especially floating over from China where they are producing all 'our' crap without the environmental regulations. So the US gov shoudl really be warning us not to breathe, but you can imagine the uproar that would create......................
Have you all heard of mercury that we don't retain? I'm really interested in this. I was so sick from some amalgam fillings at one point, so ideas on mercury really interest me.
The various forms of mercury basically relate to the number of electrons in the outer shell; or in other words the type of bonds it finds itself in with other atoms.
The form of mercury in fish is predominantly "methyl mercury", which is regarded as the worst form. Thus the information in this post is WRONG.
Methyl mercury is bad because it passes the blood brain barrier AND many cell walls with ease. Worse yet, when it is absorbed by cells in the central nervous system, it changes form that does NOT readily pass through cells or the blood brain barrier. Therefore, it tends to be absorbed into brain cells and STAY there, wreaking havoc in the mean time.
The form in amalgams is elemental mercury, and is generally regarded as poorly absorbed. HOWEVER, bugs in the gut including CANDIDA, Strep and staph species, and some evidence suggests even some probiotic bacteria can transform elemental mercury into methyl mercury.
Mercury is BAD BAD NEWS, anyway you look at it. It seems clear that mercury toxicity, regardless of any form it may be found in the environment, is a HUGE contributor to all the illness you see today, includuing much of what people are suffering from here.
BTW, my doctor believes treating heavy metal toxicity and fungal infections are one in the same. He's starting me on both chelation and antifungals now that he believes my lyme has been beaten back significantly.
from IAOMT: (turn up the sound)
http://www.iaomt.org/smokingtooth.cfm
Its called "The smoking tooth" for obvious reasons - the mercury vapour literally comes off an amalgam like smoke.
http://www.healthyawareness.com/find/00005d6a.htmIt is indeed a good video.
> The form of mercury in fish is predominantly "methyl mercury", which is regarded as the worst form
All forms of mercury are bad. Methyl mercury is often pushed as the "worst form" so that iatrogenic forms like ethylmercury (used in vaccines) and elemenetal mercury (used in amalgams) can go unnoticed. Methyl mercury is actually pretty safe if it stays that way - which is why fish are protected from the effects of Hg. The problem is that organic forms of Hg break down to the inorganic form inside the human body. It is the inorganic form which does the damage.
> Methyl mercury is bad because it passes the blood brain barrier AND many cell walls with ease ...
Yes - that is good info. Its the reason mercury is so insidious and dangerous.
> The form in amalgams is elemental mercury, and is generally regarded as poorly absorbed.
It is true that elemental mercury is poorly absorbed - e.g. you can drink liquid mercury and survive. However the *vapour* is well absorbed - the standard estimate is that 80% of mercury vapour given off by amalgams is absorbed, which is a signficant quantity. According to the World Health Organisation more than 70% of the average person's mercury burden comes from amalgams.
> HOWEVER, bugs in the gut ... can transform elemental mercury into methyl mercury.
This is alternative medicine nonsense. The danger of amalgams has nothing to do with being transformed into methyl mercury. The vapour is directly absorbed where it gets oxidised inside your cells (including brain cells). Once it gets oxidised it is stuck.
> Mercury is BAD BAD NEWS, anyway you look at it.
Absolutely.
>> > HOWEVER, bugs in the gut ... can transform elemental mercury into methyl mercury.
>> This is alternative medicine nonsense.
It never ceases to amaze me how rude people can be on the (anonymous) net. The important thing here is that we disseminate proper health information, so if I say something wrong, I welcome being corrected, especially in the case of a topic as important as mercury.
With that said, to rudely attempt to "correct" someone with information that's incorrect is particularly annoying. It's critical that we figure out this mercury connection to canida, et al. So let's keep the discourse respectable, and at least do a quick google search before we differentiate what's "alternative medicine nonsense" and what the scientific evidence might indicate.
Here are some results of my quick google search:
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Transformations of inorganic mercury by Candida albicans and Saccharomyces cerevisiae
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=182692
"The amounts of organomercury produced by the two species were proportional to the amount of HgCl2 added to the medium. In all cases C. albicans produced considerably larger amounts of methylmercury than S. cerevisiae."
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Here are some promising references for you:
51 Methylation of Mercury from dental amalgam and mercuric chloride by oral Streptococci. Heintz, Edwardson, Derand, Birkhed Scan. J. Dent. Res. 1983, 91:150-152
53 The Methylation of Mercuric Chloride by Human Intestinal Bacteria. Rowland, Grasso, Davies Experientia. Basel 1975 ,31: 1064-1065
54 Formation of methyl Mercury Compounds from inorganic Mercury . by Chlostridium cochlearium Yamada, Tonomura J Ferment Technol1972 50:159-166
http://72.14.253.104/search?q=cache:cPEZVfRUCboJ:thunderbay.indymedia.org/news/2006/09/25021.php+Bacterial+Growth+on+Dental+Restorative+Materials+in+Mucosal+Contact.+orstavic,+Arneberg,+Valderhaug+Acta&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=1
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>> The danger of amalgams has nothing to do with being transformed into methyl mercury.
Please provide your references that mercury from amalgams has NOTHING to do with being transformed into methyl mercury.
This is alternative medicine nonsense.
So is the word "candida" in most Dr. offices in America...
... as is mercury and lyme.... :(
Sorry dpd, I wasn't having a go at you, and I apologise if it came across that way.
I agree that methylation by bacteria does occur. What I disagree with is that this is the main route of entry into the human body.
Its far from clear what impact (if any) the methylation of mercury by bacteria has on human health. I haven't seen any studies looking at this in vivo and whether the quantity produced is biologically significant.
I totally agree that the main thing is to alert people to the dangers of mercury.
I can't prove a negative (that methylation has nothing to do with mercury being asborbed from amalgams). But all I can say is that there is plenty of evidence regarding the release and absorption of mercury vapour from amalgams in sufficient quantity to be a hazard to human health.
We can speculate about bacterial methylation, but we don't need to in order to show implanting mercury in the mouth is a bad idea as we already know about vapour release/absorption.
Thanks for the references BTW.
.
yep, it does seem that mercury vapor is bad news... this whole mercury issue is a total mess.
and then we have all the other heavy metals.... all the undx'd infections folks are walking around with... the artificial sweeteners, some say can be added to foods and not labeled if less than 2%....
seems sometimes like someone is trying to kill us :)
The vast majority of Mercury in the atmosphere and oceans comes from burning hydrocarbons like coal, oil and gas. Natural gas for example carries large amounts of mercury with it when it is extracted from the ground. In some parts of the World, pumps used to compress natural gas need to be shut down periodically to remove the build up of Mercury
The Mercury in fish is indeed methyl mercury. Mercury given off in the exhaust gas of coal, oil and gas burning power plants drifts over the oceans, where it is washed out of the air by rain and sinks to the ocean floor. There microbes digest the mercury and convert it to the organic methyl mercury form. Crustacia filter out the microbes and absorb their mercury load. Small fish eat the crustacia and concentrate the mercury. Large fish eat the smaller fish further mercury concentrating the mercury over time. The whole process is known as bio-amplification. Interestingly, the highest Mercury concentrations are found in sea birds, which are at the top of the aquatic food chain. Humans catch and eat the fish, and its mercury load passes from the intestine into the blood stream. Being lipophylic, methyl mercury is able to dissolve into the lipoproteins of cell membranes and pass directly into cells. Target organs for methyl mercury include the brain and kidneys. Carried on certain amino acids, Methyl Mercury is transported deep inside the brain and CNS cells, where it ultimately looses its methyl aduct and reverts to the highly energetic elemental form Hg++. This form of Mercury is highly reactive, allowing it to bond to compounds within the cell, disrupting cellular functions and eventually killing the cell.
Mercury exists in many forms, including elemental mercurous and mercuric (Hg+ and Hg++), as Mercury salts like -Chloride, -Sulphate etc, as organic forms like Ethyl- and Methyl-Mercury and as vapour.
Mercury from amalgam fillings may be absorbed in a number of ways.
- Direct transport from the tooth through tissue, nerve fibres and bone.
- As a vapour, in cases where the mercury is free within the amalgam filling
- As particles, ground off the filling during chewing, which pass into the gut.
> HOWEVER, bugs in the gut ... can transform elemental mercury into methyl mercury.
This is alternative medicine nonsense. <
Gut bacteria are an essential part of our digestive system. Amongst other things they prepare trace minerals and vitamins for digestion by converting them from non-absorbable elemental forms into highly absorbable chelates. Mercury is bacteriocidal so it should kill most bacteria...hovever there is the distinct possibility that certain bacteria do indeed have the ability to convert elemental mercury into a more absorbable form.
Just because someone has a different idea doesn't make them an idiot, but having an attitude like yours does.
> but studies (i'm told, haven't looked it up myself) show that it is the form of mercury that the human body doesn't retain
The person who wrote the above is an idiot and no doubt will be running for president of the USA soon. The key phrase is "i'm told, haven't looked it up myself".
Fish contains methylmercury which is very much retained by the human body.
> there are many different forms of mercury and i believe some forms have been in the ocean in higher quantities since before pollution.
No - mercury is in the oceans due to man made pollution. Before pollution there was no mercury to worry about.
> So why would the US gov spend so much time warning us away from fish? Becuase they are diverting attention from the number one source of mercury toxicity:
Yes!
> the air we breathe
No!!!!
The number one source of mercury is that piece of mercury implanted in your mouth (right next to your brain) which gives off vapour 24/7.
> Tons and tons of mercury especially floating over from China
Well *some* of it comes from China, but the vast majority is home grown pollution.
> where they are producing all 'our' crap without the environmental regulations
You mean like the stringent Bush legislation where by one powerplant can trade off emmissions with another? I think the US invented that one. Not even the Chinese could have come up with that twisted piece of logic.
> So the US gov shoudl really be warning us not to breathe, but you can imagine the uproar that would create......................
The US gov is already telling a lot of people not to breathe - mostly Iraqis. Dead Iraqis. Its pretty hard to breathe when you are dead.
I'm glad we had this conversation.
I'm glad you guys had that conversation too. Very erudite and helpful. Thanks.
Don't ask for references, but I have heard/read the following:
The expression "Mad as a Hatter" came about because hatters used to use MERCURY to stiffen hats and slowly go nuts from the mercury buildup.
Mercury used to be regarded as medicinal. For example, Oscar Wilde took mercury treatment for SYPHILIS. It didn't help much.
Syphilis, a spirochetal bacterium, is a close cousin of the spirochete that causes LYME DISEASE. It is thought by some that, like syphilis, Lyme Disease can be transmitted sexually. Science refers to deer and ticks being responsible for the transmission and increased incidence of Lyme Disease.
In 2002, a British neurologist theorized from data that, based on patterns of increased rates of MS in some isolated populations that had been visited by British troops, MS may be caused by STPs (sexually transmitted pathogens). Elsewhere in science, numerous connections have been made between MS and infections such as HHV6, Mycoplasma etc.
There has long been study of mercury in fish. There's lately been study of drugs in shellfish. The studies show the freshwater mussel population in North America has apparently declined by 70% lately, and these mussels face possible extinction. The theory expounded in the press is that Prozac in the water is interfering with the reproductive processes of the mussels.
A recent study says doctors have better 'bedside manner' if they engage in creative writing. The stylish fiction written in notes and letters by my own doctors with not so very good 'bedside (or other) manners' tends to disagree with that. I know who paid for my study, how about theirs?
Someone's study said 6% of commercial vaccines contain Mycoplasma.
Some literature I have seen states that, amongst other things, some types of several common vaccines contain oils known to be harmful, or seriously damaging, to the human beings they are injected into.
Recent press reports state that a lethal type of anti-biotic resistant Clostridium dificil has developed and been found in the US, Britain and Canada. An outbreak at Montreal, Canada hospitals around the time of SARS killed 2000 people - more than the total worldwide death toll from SARS.
A recent press report stated that 700,000 people per year end up in emegency rooms or hospital because of drug reactions. I think that's more than the population of Iceland.
Press reports from a few years ago state that the then largest drug company in the world's annual revenues were bigger than Spain's, and its research budget bigger than the annual GNP of Iceland.
Probably this is not much news. My focus is not what it used to be these days - because of my health I expect. I wander from one thing to the other, and back again.
I could have sworn I caught sight of an article saying it's still better to eat fish than not just the other day, but I don't recall.
Back to renewed efforts at Mercury detox now I guess.
Hi Jed , good to see you posting again ..Old Oscar, treating with Mercury you live and learn , well most of us..That ranks with the Romans putting lead in their wine ,perhaps that explains why they aren�t the force they once were!
One Italian vet treats mycoplasma infections in falcons owned by rich Arab sheiks with arsenic, with great success , so not all poisons are lethal.
Mycoplasma is a very common contaminant in cultures, if you google �mycoplasma contamination test kit � there are many firms competing for the obvious good business in supplying DIY test kits ..{I wonder]
On the soldier thing .I always hark back to the amazing findings on the gulf war syndrome ..it was found that even non combatants were affected by the syndrome in exactly the same ratio as combatants ..even though the none combatants never left home soil ..they were given the multi vaccinations though ..!!! Here �s the fish article
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/2518311.stm
Thing is millions if not billions live with no health problems with metal fillings.
This ill health thing is along an east west divide ..or perhaps more correctly rich western type societies [including Japan] against the have-nots ..
They are catching up , but the finger is pointing very much towards a western created environmental cause .i�m still sticking with antibiotics altering the balance of gut flora from the 85% good 15% bad to the quoted reverse figure [mercola]15% good 85% bad .Paul
"Old Oscar, treating with Mercury you live and learn"
There's more! Oscar also used to treat himself with ABSINTHE. I think that was more as an anti-depressant though. When he succumbed to the syphilis, there was discharge "from every orifice." Spirochetes!
"That ranks with the Romans putting lead in their wine, perhaps that explains why they aren�t the force they once were!"
Lead in Roman wine I hadn't heard about. Lead in Roman water I had. From the little I know, Roman history is more than a bit murky, so I am not so sure about the accuracy of the following (for instance there is speculation Caligula had epilepsy and/or post-encephalitic schizophrenia, not just lead poisoning), but I guess the general idea is there:
http://www.epa.gov/history/topics/perspect/lead.htm
"One Italian vet treats mycoplasma infections in falcons owned by rich Arab sheiks with arsenic, with great success, so not all poisons are lethal."
Can't comment on arsenic, other than to say it doesn't seem to have done Napoleon much good, and I don't intend to try. I think the question may be what quantity, or type, of toxins can the body detoxify before there is a SYSTEM FAILURE? To be honest, I suspect vets are more geared to treating animal infections in animals than maybe doctors are at treating animal infections in humans.
"Mycoplasma is a very common contaminant in cultures, if you google 'mycoplasma contamination test kit' there are many firms competing for the obvious good business in supplying DIY test kits .."
I have seen comments that mycoplasmas are ubiquitous and often contaminate lab equipment. That was my point, they are a contaminant and there really can be a problem if they get into the human bloodstream or tissues. If you have not read the article "Mycoplasmas: Sophisticated, Re-Emerging and Burdened by Their Notoriety" by Baseman and Tully, I think in the Historical Perspectives section, it says "detection in clinical specimens......is frequently dismissed as 'only mycoplasmas' even when they appear to be the primary pathogens." As I get it, the gist is mycoplasmas have EVOLVED into serious diseases, but are often regarded as innocuous when they can in fact be PRIMARY PATHOGENS in humans. See what you think:
http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/eid/vol3no1/baseman.htm
"Here �s the fish article"
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/2518311.stm
No, that's not the one. I think this is the article I saw:
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/medicalnews.php?newsid=54452
"Thing is millions if not billions live with no health problems with metal fillings. This ill health thing is along an east west divide ..or perhaps more correctly rich western type societies [including Japan] against the have-nots .. They are catching up , but the finger is pointing very much towards a western created environmental cause .i�m still sticking with antibiotics altering the balance of gut flora from the 85% good 15% bad to the quoted reverse figure [mercola]15% good 85% bad ."
I think if you look at a demographic atlas, there is a slightly more complicated picture of "health," "health problems" and "ill health" than we often talk about.
I was only posting on things I have read or heard about up there. To be honest, all this PONDERING makes my head spin.
As Pee Wee said, "it's like a cable knit sweater someone keeps on knitting and knitting and knitting and KNITTING!"
P.S. Those drug reaction figures are for just US emergency room visits and hospitalizations.
The population of Iceland seems to be just under 300,000 in most sources.
http://www.world-gazetteer.com/wg.php?x=1161617694&men=gpro&lng=en&dat=32&srt=npan&col=ahdq
