WebMD.com Slams Colloidal Silver; Paid $3.5 Million By Merck Pharmaceuticals

Why does the popular health website, WebMD.com, continue to spread misinformation and falsehoods about colloidal silver? We may have found the answer. See more, below…

Hi, Steve Barwick here, for www.TheSilverEdge.com...

As you likely know, WebMD.com is one of the internet's main purveyors of misinformation and outright falsehoods about colloidal silver and its usage.

And the popular website's misguided views on colloidal silver are often quoted by skeptics and naysayers who like to scare the bejabbees out of potential new colloidal silver users.

Last year, in an effort to educate WebMD.com to the error of their ways, I showed readers how to use the "User Reviews" function on the WebMD.com site to post positive reviews about colloidal silver.

You can see my article, here. And if you have the time, please feel free to go post a nice positive review of colloidal silver to the WebMD.com website, while it's still on your mind.

However, even though some 85 positive reviews on colloidal silver were posted directly after my article was published, with most of them ranking colloidal silver as a "five star" supplement, WebMD.com has still not budged an inch from their anti-colloidal silver position.

Vindictive

In fact, since my request for readers to post positive reviews on the WebMD.com website, the following lines have been added to their factually-challenged rant against colloidal silver usage:

"There are many Internet ads for the parts of a generator that produces colloidal silver at home. People who produce colloidal silver at home will likely not be able to evaluate their product for purity or strength. There are many products that are far safer and more effective than colloidal silver."

Ouch!

Since my company, The Silver Edge, is the distributor of the Micro-Particle Colloidal Silver Generator – the world's #1 best-selling colloidal silver generator – do you think perhaps WebMD.com got just a little bit miffed that I convinced a boatload of people to stuff their "User Reviews" page with positive colloidal silver reviews?

"Likely Unsafe for Use"

Regardless of their motives for adding a slam on colloidal silver generators to their anti-colloidal silver missive,WebMD.com continues to claim colloidal silver is "likely unsafe for use."

This, even though clinical study after clinical study continue to demonstrate the safety of ingested silver.

What's more, WebMD.com continues to quote the FDA as saying colloidal silver is "not considered safe or effective."

Yet in reality, colloidal silver has one of the safest toxicological profiles of all nutritional supplements, when used responsibly.

Indeed, the safety profile for colloidal silver is so good, the FDA has admitted under past Freedom of Information Act requests that it has no negative public safety data whatsoever on the supplement.

FDA Admits: No Clinical Data Showing
Colloidal Silver to Be Unsafe for Human Use

For example, here's one Freedom of Information Act request to the FDA, asking for all of their negative consumer data on colloidal silver.

Following the request, you'll find the FDA's short but revealing reply:

October 14th, 1999

Food and Drug Administration
U.S. Department Of Health and
Human Services
Public Health Service
5600 Fishers Lane
Rockville, MD 20857

Dear Sirs/Madam,

Pursuant to the Freedom of Information Act and in regard your August 17th, 1999 ruling regarding colloidal silver, could you please supply the following documentation on which you based your decision?

1. The number of deaths related to the consumption of colloidal silver.
2. The number of allergic reactions to the consumption of colloidal silver.
3. The number of harmful drug interactions from both OTC and prescription drugs when combined with colloidal silver.
4. The number of reported cases of Argyria from colloidal silver made with the AC or DC electrical process.
5. The number of cases of Argyria from colloidal silver that did not contain protein stabilizers.

Thank you for your time and consideration of this request.

Sincerely,
[name removed]
-------------------------------------------

Here's the FDA short but very revealing response to this Freedom of Information Act request for negative consumer information on colloidal silver:

Public Health Service
Center for Drug Evaluation and Research
Office of Training and Communication
Freedom of Information Staff HFD-205
5600 Fishers Lane 12 B 05
Rockville, Maryland 20857
DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES

November 3, 1999

In Response Refer to File: F99-22589

[ Name Removed ], WA 98408

Dear [ name removed ]:

This is in response to your request of 10/14/99, in which you requested adverse events associated with the use of Colloidal Silver.

Your request was received in the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research on 10/25/99.

We have searched the records from FDA's Adverse Event Reporting System (AERS) and have been unable to locate any cases that would be responsive to your request.

Charges of $3.50 (Search $3.50, Review $0, Reproduction $0, Computer time $0) will be included in a monthly invoice.

DO NOT SEND ANY PAYMENT UNTIL YOU RECEIVE AN INVOICE.

If there are any problems with this response, please notify us in writing of your specific problem(s). Please reference the above file number.

Sincerely,

Hal Stepper
Freedom of Information Technician
Office of Training and Communications
Freedom of Information Staff, HFD-205

As you can see, the FDA response for information on negative consumer data on colloidal silver was underwhelming to say the least.

Indeed, they had nothing negative to say about colloidal silver when given the chance to reveal its supposed dangers.

They had no documentation of any deaths, allergic reactions, drug interactions, argyria reports, or anything else negative for that matter.

Yet WebMD.com continues to quote the FDA as saying colloidal silver is "not considered safe or effective."

More False Claims

WebMD.com also continues to stand firm in their false claim that colloidal silver interferes with the absorption of antibiotics, saying "Taking colloidal silver along with antibiotics might decrease the effectiveness of some antibiotics."

In reality, clinical studies have demonstrated that colloidal silver actually boosts the effectiveness of antibiotics.

Even the FDA – no friend of colloidal silver – has been forced to admit through Freedom of Information Act requests that there's no evidence whatsoever for the claim that colloidal silver interferes with the absorption of antibiotic drugs.

You can read my previous article on how I forced the FDA to admit they had no negative data on colloidal silver in relation to antibiotic drugs, at this link.

Shill for Big Pharma

So why does WebMD.com continue to make such false claims against colloidal silver, in the face of so much evidence that they're dead wrong in their assertions?

Well, it should come as no surprise that the popular website trusted by millions of unsuspecting Americans turns out to be a well-paid shill for Big Pharma.

Indeed, according to TheLibertyBeacon.com, financial documents located on the website of Merck pharmaceuticals shows that WebMD.com received over $3.5 million dollars from Merck Pharmaceuticals from 2008 to 2012.

According to an article on TheLibertyBeacon.com:

"Pharmaceutical companies pay huge sums of money to buy influence.

WebMD is no exception...If we take a look at the WebMD website, you will notice a web page called Lifetime of Vaccines. It is sponsored by Merck...

…Waiting for you is a video message by Julie Gerberding, former head of the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). She promotes the reasons why we should get vaccinated.

Before you listen to her message, you should know she lobbied to get the dangerous Gardasil vaccine (also a Merck product) onto the vaccine schedule.

She is also the current president of the Vaccine Division at Merck Pharmaceuticals."

How very incestuous, right?

The former head of the CDC (the U.S. Centers for Disease Control) leaves her position there and goes to work for Merck Pharmaceuticals, in a revolving door relationship fraught with conflicts of interest.

Then, while at Merck, she starts promoting a "Lifetime of Vaccines" on WebMD.com, which in turn bills itself to Americans as a reliable "independent" voice you can trust on health care matters. And along the way, Merck pays WebMD $3.5 million.

In short, WebMD.com is in reality paid to regurgitate pro-drug propaganda for Big Pharma's worldwide drug promotion machine.

Not the First Time for Merck

This isn't the first time Merck has been exposed for paying huge sums of money to organizations that denigrate colloidal silver.

You may remember from previous articles I've written (see this link) that Merck's charitable foundation, the John Merck Fund, helped provide millions of dollars in funding to radical environmental activist groups working to force the EPA to regulate nanosilver as a "pesticide" and take antimicrobial silver products off the market.

In fact, those same environmental activists funded by the Merck charitable foundation have been working to force the EPA to ban all colloidal silver products, or regulate them as drugs (see this link).

Where's the Shrill Warnings?

While WebMD.com continues to promote vaccines for Merck, they've become famous (or should I say, infamous?) for their shrill warnings against safe, natural substances like colloidal silver.

Yet data compiled from the U.S. government's Vaccine Adverse Events Reports System (VAERS), demonstrates that as many as 145,000 children or more have died over the past 20 years as a result of adverse effects from childhood vaccinations.

So do you think you're going to find WebMD.com warning parents about those deaths?

Err…not likely.

In fact, you won't find any shrill warnings on WebMD.com claiming vaccines are "Likely Unsafe for Use." Quite the contrary, they assure readers that even with side effects, vaccines are very safe.

After all, 145,000 dead children over 20 years is just collateral damage. No big deal. Move along. Nothing to see here.

Yes, $3.5 million dollars buys a lot of silence…and lot of looking the other way while the carnage continues.

But WebMD.com's shrill and empty warnings against safe, natural colloidal silver – which has never killed anyone, by the way, in some 120 years of continuous use – continue to be spread all over the internet by people who believe the website to be a factual and independent source of reliable information on health-related issues.

Such is the world we live in, folks.
"Health" organizations the public thinks of as "most trusted" are in all too many cases actually paid liars for Big Pharma.

The Big Pharma propaganda machine is insidious. And its tentacles are spread throughout all forms of media.

But the important thing is that you know the truth, so you can make decisions that are the most conducive to the health and well-being of your family.

Yours for the safe, sane and responsible use of colloidal silver,
Steve Barwick, author