ALZHEIMER'S
DISEASE AND
ALUMINUM
The body requires small amounts of several organic metals for healthy functioning, such as iron, zinc, and magnesium which are found in food. But there is no known human need for aluminum, and the body is unable to handle the considerable quantities of aluminum that it routinely encounters in modern food, water, and medications.
Much of the aluminum we ingest is excreted, mainly in the urine. Still it is estimated that 12% to 25% of ingested aluminum is absorbed into the body. A typical daily intake may be 22 milligrams of aluminum, although some people may get 100 times this amount.
Scientists formerly thought that aluminum was only poorly absorbed and was non-toxic. But now we know that aluminum accumulates in various human tissues, especially the brain, lungs, liver, lymph nodes, bones, and parathyroid glands. Over the years aluminum will accumulate in the body, with older people having the largest accumulations, resulting in major health problems.
Accumulation of aluminum in the brain has now been linked to three different kinds of deterioration -senile dementia of the Alzheimer type, Parkinsonian dementia, and the dialysis dementia found in patients with severe kidney failure who require blood dialysis.
The first report of aluminum poisoning came out in 1921. It called attention to tremors, memory loss, jerky movements, and uncoordination associated with aluminum; but at that time very little was said or done about it. Several years ago aluminum once again came into the lime light with dialysis centers treating patients with kidney failure. Several times a week, patients would be connected to substitute kidney machines that filtered body wastes from their bloodstreams. But some of the patients started going mad. At first, the symptoms appeared only during dialysis - trouble with talking, confusion, and muscle spasms. The symptoms would go away only to return with the next treatment. Sliding swiftly downhill , patients became helpless, demented, bedridden, and finally they died. Doctors called the new disease dialysis dementia. They didn't know what caused it or why some dialysis units had many patients with the mysterious illness while others had none.
The irregular but widespread distribution of cases suggested an environmental poison or a trace element, says the man who finally found the answer, Dr. Alien C. Alfrey, a professor of medicine at the University of Colorado. Autopsies of dialysis dementia victims furnished a strategic clue: high concentrations of aluminum in the brain cells.
It didn't take long to discover the source of the aluminum contamination. Large amounts of tap water go into the dialysis solution used to flush wastes out of a patient's bloodstream. (Many municipalities use aluminum to remove impurities from their water supplies.) Although the dialysis treatment removed body wastes, aluminum eluded the filtering system by attaching itself to blood proteins. As soon as it was recognized that aluminum was the culprit, dialysis centers started using aluminum-free water for their patients and there have been no new victims of dialysis dementia.
SOURCES OF ALUMINUM THAT WE INGEST
Aluminum salts are widely used as food additives, in non-prescription drugs, and as a clarifying agent in the treatment of community water supplies.
Aluminum phosphates are the most commonly used aluminum-containing food additives in the U.S., being frequently added to cake mixes, frozen dough, self-rising flours, processed cheeses, and cheese foods. They act as emulsifying agents, giving a soft textured cheese which easily melts. Current U.S. regulations allow 3% aluminum phosphates in processed cheese products, which means that one slice of processed cheese could supply up to 50 mg of aluminum.
Aluminum sulfates (alums) are common ingredients in household baking powders. A teaspoonful of aluminum-containing baking powder may contain about 70 mg of aluminum, so that a cake prepared with 2 tsp. of this powder would contain 10 mg of aluminum per small serving of cake. Aluminum sulfate is also being used as a food starch modifier. Some companies use aluminum sulfate as firming agents in pickled vegetables and fruits. A medium-sized pickled cucumber soaked in Dil alum solution may contain 5 to 10 mg aluminum.
Aluminum silicates are ordinarily used as anti-caking agents in dry, powdered products. Some chewing gums contain aluminum at a level of 3-4 mg per stick.
Soft drinks have aluminum. Doctors at John Hunter Hospital analysed 106 aluminum cans and bottles representing 52 different beverages. Overall they found that the most acidic beverages packaged in aluminum cans had the highest aluminum content. Researchers found that non-cola soft drinks in aluminum cans contained the highest levels of aluminum at an average of 33.4 me M/L. Cola drinks contained 24.4 me M/L in cans and 8.9 me M/L in bottles. To put the following figures in perspective, you should know that the World Health Organization and the European Economic Community recommend that drinking water not contain over 7.4 me M/L of aluminum. (Medical Journal, August 92:156 (9): 604-5
Many non-prescription drugs also contain substantial levels of aluminum, including antacids (for peptic ulcer, etc.), internal anti-pain medications (buffered aspirin for arthritic pain and swelling), diarrhea medicines (like Kaopectate) and hemorrhoidal medications. Lipsticks and antiperspirants also contain high levels of aluminum. An antacid containing aluminum hydroxide gel may provide up to 200 mg of aluminum per dose. Six grams of buffered aspirin may provide over 400 mg of aluminum.
As one can readily see, aluminum is found in many items people use daily. It is even in common table salt; however, sea salt, pickling salt, and rock salt contain no aluminum.
Aluminum interferes with handling of iron by the body as well as the formation of heme (the pigment part of hemoglobin in red blood cells). Thus, an excess of aluminum can cause anemia.
Several reports suggest that a high aluminum intake may interfere with handling of calcium, fluoride, and phosphorus by the body.
As mentioned earlier, accumulation of aluminum in the brain has now been linked to Alzheimer's disease. Patients with Alzheimer's have brain aluminum concentrations that are about four times higher than normal. In the U.S. almost 3 mil ion people have Alzheimer's, and it kills over 100,000 people a year. European studies have recently found that communities with higher concentrations of aluminum in their drinking water had substantially more victims of Alzheimer's disease.
FACTS ON ALUMINUM COOKWARE
You buy a nice set of shiny aluminum cookware at the store, and six months later the cookware is dull and pitted - what happened to it? The aluminum has left the cookware and gone into the food that was cooked in it.
Boil some water in an aluminum kettle, pour it in a glass, and by holding it up to the light you will see aluminum particles floating in the water.
Peeled potatoes, if allowed to stand in an aluminum dish overnight, will become yellow, and when cooked will look shriveled and have dark streaks through the inner part. Why? The potatoes absorbed some of the aluminum.
An acidic food heated and stored in aluminum cookware can add up to 4 mg of aluminum to a serving of the food. One of the strongest indictments against aluminum pots and pans was the testimony of Dr. H. A. McGuigan before the Federal Trade Commission in docket Case No. 540.
A summary of Dr. McGuigan's findings, circulated by the National Committee Against Fluoridation, charges that:
1. Boiling water in aluminum produces hydroxide poison.
2. Boiling an egg in aluminum cookware produces phosphate.
3. Boiling meat in aluminum cookware produces chloride.
4. Frying bacon in aluminum cookware produces a powerful narcotic acid, which in large doses may cause coma.
5. All vegetables cooked in aluminum produce hydroxide poison, which neutralizes the digestive juices, robbing them of their value to digest food, and producing stomach and gastrointestinal troubles.
6. Aluminum poison will produce acidosis which destroys the red blood cells producing a condition similar to anemia.
The wise thing to do is to throw away all your aluminum cookware and replace it with stainless steel, glass, teflon, etc. cookware.
Aluminum is a poison to the human body; and the higher the concentration of aluminum in the body, the more health problems one will have. For optimum health one must stop eating or drinking anything that contains aluminum, and begin drinking 8 or more glasses of distilled water or reverse osmosis water daily. Both distilled and reverse osmosis water is so pure and free of all minerals, chemicals, etc., that it will start carrying the aluminum deposits out of the body and you can once again begin to experience better health.