Mention of one of the original scams in a recent comment brought the topic, flooding with unexpected emotion, to me this week. I?ve touched on this subject before under the heading of MS Quackery and it?s time it was put to bed.
Mercury poisoning was first ?linked? to multiple sclerosis in the surrounds of Minamata Bay, Japan in the 1950?s. To be fair, looking at the symptoms of this massive episode which now takes on the name of the bay ? Minamata Disease, you can see why one might think of MS:
Symptoms include ataxia, numbness in the hands and feet, general muscle weakness, narrowing of the field of vision and damage to hearing and speech. In extreme cases paralysis, coma, and even death were possible.
Sound familiar?
The massive pollution of the bay with mercury by a local manufacturing factory fed bacteria which converted the heavy metal into an organic compound called methylmercury which fed smaller fish that in turn fed larger fish and then further up the food chain.
?Dancing Cat Fever? was what the locals called the disorder as small felines were the first land animals to begin showing signs of the neurological destruction of methylmercury poisoning; stumbling and falling. Soon birds that ate the poisoned fish were falling from the sky and not long after that, fishermen and their families began to exhibit MS-like symptoms.
Back in the days before MRI, it can be understood why some would think that their MS symptoms might have been linkable to mercury. I?ve asked my doctor if early exposure to mercury (yes, I know of exposure beyond fillings for me) may have ?caused? my symptoms. He showed me MR images of mercury poisoning and showed me mine. They look nothing alike.
Many in the western world have been exposed to mercury in the form of dental amalgam of silver. The more the horrors of mercury poisoning became known to us (think about the tuna scares in the ?70s, etc) the more suspect we became about those fillings.
An entire business built up around removal of dental fillings at about that time. One of the big factors these captains of MS Inc touted was that fillings could cause? you guessed it, multiple sclerosis.
Truth be told, even the FDA now states that some mercury likely does ?leak? from old fillings. Number of fillings has never been correlated to MS, no particular dentist or dental practice has been linked to increased incidence and, quite frankly, people with MS seem to have less mercury in our brains than controls.
The likely exposure to mercury vapor in the removal of fillings is many times higher than the 1-3 micrograms that the FDA advises may leak from old fillings. Consumer reports has even warned, on numerous occasions, of dentists who breaks the American Dental Association?s code of ethics by recommending that a non-allergic patient have fillings removed to prevent/cure MS saying, ?if a dentist wants to remove your fillings because they contain mercury, watch your wallet?
Multiple Sclerosis has been proven on several occasions to have nothing to do with mercury. Not mercury ingested from fish, not mercury from silver amalgam dental fillings, not even from mercury played with as a child (yup, that was me). If someone is telling you that your MS is due to your fillings, tell them they have no idea what they are talking about. It?s that simple.
Wishing you and your friends the best of health.
Cheers
Trevis
You can also follow me via our Life With MS Facebook page, on Twitter, and in our group on MS Connection.org. Also, check out our bi-monthly MS blog for the United Kingdom, look for our very special new monthly blog for the National MS Society, and don?t forget to check out TrevisLGleason.com.
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