I first learned about silver’s medicinal uses as a kid when we used a silver paste on a wound of one of our horses. Then again when I worked as a vet tech. And again as a nurse in the operating room for burns and traumatic wounds.
Funny enough, however, despite it’s fairly common use in the medical world, when you mention using silver a lot of people’s reaction is less than approving. Some are even flabbergasted that anyone would use such a “dangerous” thing. Touted claims of turning people blue and making them crazy, only half of which is even remotely a possibility, have people fearful and dismissive. The reality is silver in certain forms is incredibly beneficial to the body and the healing process due to it’s ability to target infected, inflamed, diseased tissue while not harming the healthy cells.
Throughout history, various civilizations, such as the Phoenician, Macedonian, and Persian empires, have used silver to limit the spread of human disease by incorporating the metal into items used in daily life. The earliest recorded use of silver for therapeutic purposes dates back to the Han Dynasty in China around 1500 B.C.E. In the early 20th century with the discovery of penicillin, a shift towards pharmaceutical antibiotics occurred and silver took a back seat in most mainstream medicine atmospheres. However, the development of increasing levels of bacterial resistance has brought silver back to the table as an effective antimicrobial compound.
A common fear surrounding using Colloidal Silver is that you can turn yourself blue and become sick from silver toxicity. To understand why this risk is extremely low, if not totally nonexistent, we need to understand the difference between inorganic and organic silver. Inorganic silvers, such as, silver sulphate, silver nitrate, silver sulphadiazine, silver oxide, silver phosphate, and silver chloride, have a higher potential to accumulate in your body because of their inorganic nature. These products should only be used periodically for short periods of time. However, organic silver, such as colloidal silver preparations, silver-zinc allantoinate, and silver proteins, have shown very little bioaccumulation activity and are very safe for regular use. Some of what makes organic and inorganic substances different is that organic substances are biological and more complex in nature, they’re water insoluble and form covalent bonds. Organic compounds are found in nature, as is. Whereas inorganic compounds are natural compounds manipulated by laboratory processes to create a new compound. This is why the body processes them differently. You are organic.
For the science buffs, here are some published articles about the use of colloidal silver:
https://pubchem.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/compound/silver
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24431107/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23017226/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29884580/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25709674/
https://chemistry-europe.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/cmdc.202000390
