Clinical summaries of all actual ASAP safety studies, to date

This link will take you to the actual safety documents summaries, to date, performed on the American Biotech Labs products. These are documents from which much of the information below was drawn. They are the original signed laboratory statements, identifying the Lab, researchers and technicians who performed the studies and the protocols which were employed. No other manufacturer of commercially available nutritional supplement silver preparations has performed this level of credible research into the safety and efficacy of their products. In fact, the majority of them haven’t performed any. If they claim that they have… ask to see it.

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ASAP Solution, Argyria and Risk

What Is Argyria?

American Biotech Labs’ silver products are non-addictive, non-toxic and are not a salt. The extreme misuse of some silver salt compounds may cause a condition called argyria. Argyria has no known side effects except that it causes a graying of the skin color. The condition is non-toxic and only cosmetic in nature. In most cases the discoloration is permanent.

What Causes Argyria?

Argyria has resulted from extreme misuse of very strong silver solutions consisting of silver salts, including silver nitrate, silver arsphenamine, silver chloride and possibly silver iodide. These products were sold until 1975 under various labels consisting of solutions ranging from 5-30% silver [50,000-300,000 ppm (parts per million)] (Federal Register, FDA-21CFR Part 310, pg. 53685).

Silver Salts Are Not Colloidal Silver

Silver salts have mistakenly been called colloidal silver products by some misguided individuals. By definition, the word colloidal means a system in which particles larger than molecules in size (in this case retaining their metallic identity) of one substance are suspended throughout a second substance. In the case of American Biotech Labs’ silver products, finite particles of metallic silver are suspended within highly purified water. Silver salts readily dissolve in water, and therefore are not colloidal in nature.

No Comparison Between New And Old Products

American Biotech Labs’ silver products have been proven to kill bacteria at levels of between 2.5 – 5 ppm, and since the old silver products ranged between 50,000 – 300,000 ppm, there is really no comparison. American Biotech Labs’ products are effective with concentrations of 20,000 – 60,000 times less silver in the solution. A better, patented technology which produces a more useful (bacteria lethal) product would seem to be the difference. Because American Biotech Labs’ silver solutions effectively kill bacteria using thousands of times less silver, the risk of any possible side effects has been all but eliminated.

Minimum Amount Of Silver Known To Cause Argyria

Hill and Pillsbury (1939) stated, “…the ordinary clinical use of colloidal silver compounds practically never gives rise to any gross untoward effect other than argyria.” The minimum amount of silver known to cause argyria in adults, from the use of any silver compound (including salts) is 900 mg of silver taken orally in one year. In order to reach this level of silver intake, an individual would have to consume 380 – 8 oz. bottles of American Biotech Labs’ 10 ppm ASAP Solution silver product within a year. Suggested adult dosage is about ½ to 1 teaspoon taken one to three times daily. This means that an individual would have to consume over 50 times the normal adult dosage, every day for a year, to even reach the lowest level ever known to cause argyria. It should be noted that EPA standards for the amount of silver that can be safely consumed in drinking water is .005 milligrams per kilogram of body weight per day (EPA RED document, page 2, 4^th paragraph). This means that a normal sized adult could consume an ounce (6 tsp) of the 10 ppm ASAP Solution every day, for a 72 year lifespan and still be within the safe limits as defined by the EPA. In the EPA RED document for silver, the EPA goes on to state (page 3, 4^th paragraph) "The EPA does not anticipate that dietary exposure to these low levels of silver will be associated with any significant degree of risk."

American Biotech Labs has had independent in vivo toxicity tests completed on its ASAP Solution product that showed that at as much as 200 times the normal adult dosage, or the equivalent of an adult consuming 32 full ounces of the 10 ppm product at one sitting, the ASAP Solution was found completely non-toxic to the test animals. As was noted above, most adults using the ASAP Solution only use about 1 – 3 teaspoons a day.

Absorption And Retention Of Ingested Silver

According to the EPA IRIS Report on silver (Integrated Risk Information Systems) , page 5, 1st paragraph, it states that a number of tests were completed to test the absorption and retention of ingested silver in a number of animals (including primates). In conclusion, the test work indicated that between 90 – 99% of ingested silver was excreted on the second day after ingestion, and greater than 99% was excreted in less than a week. So, in other words almost all of the silver was out of the body in only two days, which indicates that silver does not build up in the system when consumed in small amounts. [Lifesilver Editor’s note: As you will see elsewhere at this site, small amounts of ASAP Solution have been scientifically proven to possess very powerful antibiotic properties.]

Levels Of Silver Usage Historically Deemed Safe

Many different silver products have been and are still being used throughout the medical industry. Up until the advent of chemical antibiotics, as we now know them, which came about in the 1940s, some very strong silver products were being used as antibiotics. Of the millions of people who used these concentrated silver products, there were no reported deaths and only 239 reported cases of generalized argyria (EPA Report ECAO-CIN-026, January 1991, page VI-3). In that same EPA report, on page VI-4, it states that Gaul and Staud (1935) suggested 8 grams of silver arsphenamine (administered by injection at 145,000 ppm strength) as a safe total dose. They also noted that other authors suggested safe total doses of 12 – 15 grams, based on clinical experience. The work of Furchner, et al (1968), as stated above, showed that small amounts of silver did not build up in the system of primates. For argument’s sake, if we assumed that every bit of ingested silver was retained by the body, and that a person was using the American Biotech Labs’ 10 ppm, ASAP Solution at a level of two teaspoons daily, then using the Gaul and Staud’s safe levels of total silver usage of 8 grams, we can state that it would take an individual 235.66 years of daily usage, at two teaspoons, to achieve the total consumption of 8 grams (a level that they deemed safe).

Almost Everyone Has Used Silver To Kill Bacteria

Just about every single person born in the United States in the last 80 years was treated with a silver product at the time of birth. Silver was found to be so safe and effective at killing the bacteria that newborns pick up in their eyes coming through the birth canal, that at one point, it was mandated by law that it be used in the hospitals and clinics.

ASAP Silver VS Prescription Antibiotics Usage

Prescription antibiotic usage, unlike silver, can be very dangerous. In numerous cases it can cause death…which is a fairly serious and permanent side effect. In an article in JAMA (Journal of the American Medical Association), December, 2000, Barbara Starfield estimated that there were 106,000 deaths annually caused by properly administered antibiotics. This number does not include deaths from antibiotic usage whereby the antibiotics were used or prescribed incorrectly. There were no reported deaths in 2000 from the use of silver products.

Does ASAP Solution harm the helpful bacteria in our intestines?

Individuals who have taken the ASAP Solution for an extended period of time report no negative gastro-intestinal side effects. Two different independent studies have been completed on probiotic bacteria and the ASAP solution. the ASAP solution was found to have no negative effect on the helpful or probiotic bacteria in both studies.

Conclusion

There is no comparison on the issue of safety in usage between silver products and prescription antibiotics. Silver is obviously much safer to use. According to the EPA, who is in charge of defining safe levels of any mineral in water used for ingestion or drinking, the oral consumption of small amounts of silver in water, on a daily basis, poses no significant degree of risk. Unless an individual were constantly consuming (every day for over a year) over 50 times the recommended daily dosage of the ASAP Solution, at 10 ppm, there is literally no possibility of that individual contracting the non-toxic condition called argyria.

[The above information is taken from the American Biotech Labs’ Product Information Report for ASAP Solution]

Non-Toxicity Test Work Summary:

In order to insure not only the best product, but also a safe product, American Silver L.L.C. [American Biotech Labs] hired an independent laboratory to do a toxicology study on the ASAP Solution. The test, called an LD-50 test, was performed in accordance with the guidelines of the Federal Hazardous Substances Act (FHSA) Regulations, 16 CFR 1500.

In the test work, the ASAP Solution was given to a number of both male and female test rats. The amount of ASAP Solution given to the rats was 5g/kg, or the equivalent of a 200 pound man taking 192 teaspoons of about 4 full 8 ounce bottles of the ASAP 10ppm solution at one time (the normal adult dosage is one or two teaspoons/day).

As a result of the test work, the independent laboratory made the following conclusion, "Under the conditions of this study, there was no mortality or significant evidence of toxicity observed in the rats. The test article (ASAP Solution) would not be considered toxic at a dose of 5g/kg by oral route in the rat."