I think the usage of colloidal silver as antibiotic is interesting. It used to be used in the West as antibiotic before we had Penicillin.
Unfortunately, nobody run the necessary studies that are needed to see whether it’s a good treatment for antibiotic-resistant bacterial infection. The inability to patent the treatment seems to stop it from being studied.
It’s crazy that when people speak about the dangers of antibiotic resistance nobody funds the colloidal silver studies.
At the same time it’s a brute-force treatment that might turn your skin blue and phage therapy seems to be more promising for a future where we want better health outcomes and not just replace one antibiotica with a similar instrument.
I only know about colloidal silver as a topical treatment (a cream for wounds that I think I only ever prescribed twice). Are you talking about other usage methods? My fantasy flesh-eating multi-resistant infection is easily accessible—silver was a back-up thought after rushing to the kitchen for salt and garlic.
A bit of background info. about bacteriophages would be useful in your post. For general interest and understanding. The following is from the bottom of the case study here:
Derived from the Greek words meaning “bacteria eater,” bacteriophages are ancient and abundant — found on land, in water, within any form of life harboring their target. According to Rowher at San Diego State University and colleagues in their book Life in Our Phage World, phages cause a trillion trillion successful infections per second and destroy up to 40 percent of all bacterial cells in the ocean every day.
Thousands of varieties of phage exist, each evolved to infect only one type or a few types of bacteria. Like other viruses, they cannot replicate by themselves, but must commandeer the reproductive machinery of bacteria. To do so, they attach to a bacterium and insert their genetic material. Lytic phages then destroy the cell, splitting it open to release new viral particles to continue the process. As such, phages could be considered the only “drug”’ capable of multiplying; when their job is done, they are excreted by the body.
The potential for targeting individual bacterium in patients—fantastic.
The potential for patents on individual bacterium—frightening.
The thought that there’s all these ‘specific bacterial destroyers’ out there—weird and wonderful.
I really feel the need to hope in writing that phage therapy is something that’s developed in the spirit of co-operation and sharing. To treat patients with infections, not for generating profits at the expense of people who need help.
For better health outcomes we shouldn’t forget the basics: “Bugs” are ubiquitous. Strong immune systems to fight the baddies are more likely with healthy lifestyles in natural environments—unpolluted and full of all the other organisms we evolved encased in. If we’re all about the good bugs, the bad bugs can’t get established so easily.
I think those are two separate important topics. On the one hand it’s a change that academia doesn’t research about how to strenghten the immune system.
Colloidal silver can also be ingested orally to fight bacteria and was used that way in the past in the 19th century. A friend of mine was into the topic of using silver for that purpose for a while but we lack good research that analyses which ways of using silver are useful.
I really feel the need to hope in writing that phage therapy is something that’s developed in the spirit of co-operation and sharing. To treat patients with infections, not for generating profits at the expense of people who need help.
If you create profits by giving people medical treatment that allows them to be healthy you aren’t earning those profits at the expense of people who need help but at their benefit.
It seems to me like there are strong network effect if you have one big company that develops algorithms for analyzing which virus to use in particular cases and which also constantly develops new viruses as new strains of viruses appear.
Strong immune systems to fight the baddies are more likely with healthy lifestyles in natural environments—unpolluted and full of all the other organisms we evolved encased in. If we’re all about the good bugs, the bad bugs can’t get established so easily.
I think those are two separate important topics. On the one hand it’s a change that academia doesn’t research about how to strengthen the immune system.
Replacing bad bacteria with good bacteria is an exiting application. Combining probiotics with phage therapy to make the good bacteria out-compete the bad bacteria is exiting. It might lead to the ability to totally eliminate Streptococcus strains that cause caries out of our mouths.
I think the usage of colloidal silver as antibiotic is interesting. It used to be used in the West as antibiotic before we had Penicillin.
Unfortunately, nobody run the necessary studies that are needed to see whether it’s a good treatment for antibiotic-resistant bacterial infection. The inability to patent the treatment seems to stop it from being studied.
It’s crazy that when people speak about the dangers of antibiotic resistance nobody funds the colloidal silver studies.
At the same time it’s a brute-force treatment that might turn your skin blue and phage therapy seems to be more promising for a future where we want better health outcomes and not just replace one antibiotica with a similar instrument.
I only know about colloidal silver as a topical treatment (a cream for wounds that I think I only ever prescribed twice). Are you talking about other usage methods? My fantasy flesh-eating multi-resistant infection is easily accessible—silver was a back-up thought after rushing to the kitchen for salt and garlic.
A bit of background info. about bacteriophages would be useful in your post. For general interest and understanding. The following is from the bottom of the case study here:
The potential for targeting individual bacterium in patients—fantastic.
The potential for patents on individual bacterium—frightening.
The thought that there’s all these ‘specific bacterial destroyers’ out there—weird and wonderful.
I really feel the need to hope in writing that phage therapy is something that’s developed in the spirit of co-operation and sharing. To treat patients with infections, not for generating profits at the expense of people who need help.
For better health outcomes we shouldn’t forget the basics: “Bugs” are ubiquitous. Strong immune systems to fight the baddies are more likely with healthy lifestyles in natural environments—unpolluted and full of all the other organisms we evolved encased in. If we’re all about the good bugs, the bad bugs can’t get established so easily.
I integrated information about phages from your link into my article.
Colloidal silver can also be ingested orally to fight bacteria and was used that way in the past in the 19th century. A friend of mine was into the topic of using silver for that purpose for a while but we lack good research that analyses which ways of using silver are useful.
https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/colloidal-silver#what-is-it gives you a summary about claims that are made about it.
If you create profits by giving people medical treatment that allows them to be healthy you aren’t earning those profits at the expense of people who need help but at their benefit.
It seems to me like there are strong network effect if you have one big company that develops algorithms for analyzing which virus to use in particular cases and which also constantly develops new viruses as new strains of viruses appear.
I think those are two separate important topics. On the one hand it’s a change that academia doesn’t research about how to strengthen the immune system.
Replacing bad bacteria with good bacteria is an exiting application. Combining probiotics with phage therapy to make the good bacteria out-compete the bad bacteria is exiting. It might lead to the ability to totally eliminate Streptococcus strains that cause caries out of our mouths.