So what do we do in the middle of this mess? We turn medicine’s most basic principles upside down. Below is the very beginning of a chapter I published years ago called Beyond Paracelsus.[1] It describes the very heart of pharmaceutical pharmacology. As you read this remember that we are going to create a philosophy and practice of medicine exactly 180 degrees to the opposite. This is no small subject and it would be helpful to understand prerequisite information like the Science of Low Doses meaning that in reality we find that poisons poison people even at ultra low doses. That is what poisons in general do – they poison people, even in minuscule amounts.
While there is no such thing as a safe chemical, it must be realized there
is no chemical that cannot be used safely by limiting the dose or exposure.
Poisons can be safely used and be of benefit to society when used appropriately.
-Royal Society of Chemistry
The problem all started with Paracelsus, sometimes called the “father” of toxicology, who wrote: “The dose makes the poison.” The original quote actually is: “All things are poison and nothing (is) without poison; only the dose makes that a thing is no poison.” In other words, the amount of a substance a person is exposed to is as important as the nature of the substance. For example, small doses of aspirin can be beneficial to a person, but at very high doses aspirin can be deadly. In some individuals, even at very low doses, aspirin may be deadly. We all know that everyone can drown in water and even too much oxygen will do you in. Thus it was Paracelsus’ belief that it was not the substance which was toxic (since everything is toxic) but the amount. But is this really helpful to us today and does it reflect present realities? The big problem with people who fanatically follow Paracelsus comes down to this: hardcore believers in the dose makes the poison medical philosophy tend to forget one important thing and that is – poison poisons people, even at ultra low doses.
It is absurd to label pure water as
poisonous simply because one can drown in it.
The basic principle of Natural Allopathic Medicine is just the opposite of orthodox allopathic medicine. Instead of using poisons at low doses we use concentrated nutritional substances at exceptionally high dosages. I am not suggesting we drown anyone or dump a ton of vitamin C on a baby to see if he or she can breathe under all that weight. Natural Allopathic Medicine is the name not only of a new book of mine in progress but is the name of the medical approach I am introducing to the world in 2009.
If someone is having a stroke or heart attack you certainly do not
want to throw them into a bath with four ounces of magnesium inside.
In Natural Allopathic Medicine we assume all poisons have detrimental effect we
only need calculate the total effect from the dose factoring individual sensitivity.
A sane rule of thumb for magnesium supplementation (not for therapeutic effect) is approximately 6-8 mg/kg (3-4 mg per pound) of body weight per day. That translates into a total dietary magnesium intake of 600 to 900 mg per day for a 200-lb man, which is already way above the RDA, about double. With children some researchers indicate that 10 mg/kg/day are appropriate because of their low body weight and increased requirements for growth. Athletes also need more depending on their stress and training levels and we can always adjust upwards when under great emotional stress or when seriously ill.
Our cells are best served when they are brimming with magnesium reserves.
Magnesium chloride and Vitamin C have similar toxicity profiles with overdose from both resulting at worst usually in diarrhea unless the kidneys are seriously compromised.
[1] Auroleus Phillipus Theostratus Bombastus von Hohenheim, immortalized as “Paracelsus,” was born in 1493. Paracelsus, a Swiss doctor, pioneered the use of chemicals and minerals in medicine. His name appears as a significant figure among voluminous numbers of works on homeopathy, natural medicine, alternative medicine, and botanical studies. Many see him as the predecessor of chemical pharmacology and therapeutics and the most original medical thinker of the sixteenth century.