Normally when we talk of silver on here, we talk about coins or rounds. But what of using it for health? Possible?

Hive account@bozz turned me on to this. I forget the post, but we got into a conversation in the comments where he mentioned that some people take silver supplements. He also mentioned a strange side effect of taking them, that you can turn blue.

Well, you know I just had to look into this.

Back in the day, I used to listen to Dr Weil and his ideas on what he called integrative health. If you're unfamiliar, Dr. Weil was renowned for his balanced health philosophies. His main claim was the suggestion that every culture has different approaches to healing, and some seem to work better than Western approaches, so it only makes sense to look into everything and combine what works into one system. I liked him. I read many of his books, listened to some of his audiobooks, and generally followed his advice. But this was a long time ago, before I had kids and when I had more time to follow things like that. I haven't really read about alternative health for a long time.

All this is to say, I'm not a stranger to alternative ideas about health. That said, I had never come across the idea of ingesting silver for health benefits. I had heard about the anti-microbial effects. Some time ago a company was spending a lot of money to advertise on pretty much all the tech-related podcasts about their underwear that had silver weaved into it. Their claim was that the silver in their underwear made it more clean because it killed off more bacteria. They later expanded their line to include undershirts, socks, and other clothes. I forget the company, unfortunately, so I can't see if it is still around or give a link.

But that's wearing it in your clothes, not ingesting it.

Upon researching, I discovered the supplements are called colloidal silver. Colloidal silver is approved for use in lotion or in bandages, as it does show beneficial effects when used topically, but it is not approved for use as a supplement in the US, at least not according to the sites I checked. It doesn't seem to be allowed in Japan at all.

Anyway, it is said by proponents to be something of a miracle supplement, curing us of everything even cancer. As such, it seems to be relatively popular. It is said that the silver particles are small enough to slip into bacterial cells and interferes with their metabolic processes, damaging their DNA, and leading to their death. It is also said to interfere with virus proteins, preventing virus replication. Sounds good, right?

On the other hand, the FDA warns that there is no evidence supporting these claims and that ingesting it is associated with serious health risks, including argyia (we'll come back to this one), neurological damage, liver and kidney trouble. Yicks!

It seems like there is a long history here. Back in the day colloidal silver, which just means silver particles suspended in a liquid, was fairly common and it was considered an all-purpose remedy. But in the 20th century as our medical science rapidly improved, it was abandoned as we discovered antibiotics which are safer.

So let's go back to that side-effect named argyia. This is a condition where your skin turns blue-gray due to the buildup of silver in your skin. Blue skin also indicates that your other organs already also have a buildup of silver. There doesn't seem to be any direct harmful effects from this condition, but there isn't a lot of research so we don't know well what this condition may lead to. At any rate, it seems to be permanent. So you know, if you've always wanted to be blue, I guess there is a way!

The most prominent suffer of argyria was Paul Karason, who turned a deep purple-blue. He was very blue. He even has his own Wikipedia page.

So I guess there are some advantages. Turn blue and use it to become famous!

Interesting stuff. I think I probably won't be in line to eat any silver, but I suppose it will be interesting to see if there is any more research here and what they find.

I'll stick with just collecting silver coins.

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David LaSpina is an American photographer and translator lost in Japan, trying to capture the beauty of this country one photo at a time and searching for the perfect haiku. He blogs here and at laspina.org. Write him on Twitter or Mastodon.

Silver Supplements & The Art of Turning Blue

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