amalgum fillings

[Guest guest]

I put this together a while ago so apologies to those of you who have seen it

before but it seemed like a sensible time to re-send this to the group given

what has been discussed recently.

This is a summary of some of the research and articles I have read about

mercury amalgum fillings

Some of the research which suggests mercury is a problem is as follows:-

(this is information published by the Brompton Dental Health Clinic)

According to the World Health Organisation the major exposure to mercury is

from dental amalgum. They also say that there is no lower level of mercury

exposure that can be considered harmless.

The German Health Ministry now recommend no amalgum for women of reproductive

age. The Germany Federal Registry of Dentists has written to their Ministry

of Health requesting that he rule that dental amalgum be banned altogether.

Sweden has banned the use of amalgum fillings completely.

Austria plans to ban amalgum by the year 2000. Furthermore, mercury use is

banned in pregnant women.

This information was published in a magazine called 'What Doctors Don't tell

you':-

Past studies have shown that dentists have high concentration of body mercury

and double the number of brain tumours (published in the British Journal of

Industrial Medicine).

Recently, Professor Gustav Drasch, a forensic toxicologist in Munich examined

the bodies of dead human babies. They found their levels of mercury

correlated significantly with the number of amalgum fillings in their mothers.

A Dr Vimy of the Univeristy of Calgary in Alberta has spent a decade examing

the effects of amalgum fillings on sheep, monkeys and humans. One month

after placing amaglum fillings in eight adult sheep substantial quantites of

mercury appeared in the lung, the gastrointestinal tract and the jaw tissue.

It rapidly settled into the liver and kidneys.

After placing the mercury in the teeth of pregnant sheep they found that, two

weeks later, the mercury was evident in foetal blood, amniotic fluid,

pituitary glands, liver, kidney and part of the placenta. Within a month,

most foetal tissue had higher levels of mercury than the mother did.

When he presented his evidence to the British Dental Society Dr Vimy

stressed that he is a scientist and is not setting out to prove anything in

particular - but simply to carry out research.

In a consolidated report of 6 separate studies of patients who had their

amalgam fillings replaced, nearly all the 1,600 participants reported cure or

improvement of 31 types of conditions. The studies from four countries

showed that 89% of those who said they suffered from allergies reported an

improvement; headaches 87% were improved; urinary tract problems 76%. Three

quarters of those with MS said they were better or cured.

The party line of the American Dental Association and the British Dental

Association is that the mercury in amalgum fillings becomes inert, or locked

in, when mixed with other metals and placed in the mouth. But numerous

researchers have proved not only that mercury vapours are continuously

released from the fillings, but that it also corrodes in the mouth - that is,

rusts, as the metallic ions and vapour form on the amalgum surface - once it

comes into contact with heat, saliva and such elements as fluoride or large

gold fillings. Although most of these products get excreted, about 10%

accumulate in the various organs and tissues of the body according to

researchers at the University of Calgary in Canada.

Professor Masi of Western New England College in Springfield, Massachusetts,

who has studied this issue in detail, discovered that all metals used as

restorative dental materials are capable of corroding. The five metals

contained in amalgum can combine to produce, all floating around in the body

to unknown effect.

This is taken from an article in the International Journal of Alternative and

Complementary Medicine.

'The problem with mercury is that in small doses it does not produce one

specific symptom or disease. As 'modern' medicine is geared up mainly into

thinking that for every single cause/symptom there is a single treatment, the

link between mercury amalgums and disease is therefore difficult to prove.

What we do know however, is that mercury has the ability to enter into every

single cell in the body - amalgums therefore have the potential to cause

cellular and enzyme dysfunction

It is a scientific fact that when two dissimilar metals are immersed in an

electrolyte (a fluid) a galvanic cell is created whereby one metal corrodes

and an electric potential, or current, ensues. Even one filling is enough

for different part of that filling to reract (with saliva) and with one

another to create this cell.

Measurement of this voltage (in millivolts) . . . especially in patients with

more than two to three fillings will show that quite often the electrical

power involved is a thousand times that used in nerve conduction. The effect

is as if there is a strong battery at the base of the brain!'