Page 85 - Spring2018

All Thumbs Book Reviews

Mercury Poisoning—The Undiagnosed amalgam, vaccines and numerous products (e.g.,
Epidemic: Sources of Mercury and skin creams, contact lens solutions, latex paints
How to Detox and pesticides). Some exposures may be hidden,
By David Hammond including broken fluorescent light bulbs, indus-
CreateSpace Independent trial emissions and casual spills. Hammond cites
Publishing Platform many case studies of odd illnesses eventually
attributable to these types of exposures.
As a young man in the 1970s, David Ham- In the twenty short but compelling chapters
mond labored in an Australian steel factory. that form the bulk of the book, Hammond re-
There he developed a mysterious illness involv- views the science documenting mercury’s role in
ing fatigue, diarrhea, sinusitis, insomnia, thirst, chronic illnesses (such as Alzheimer’s disease,
irritability and loss of interest in socializing. autism, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder,
Even after he left the job, his symptoms con- allergies and chronic fatigue), doing a heroic job
tinued to come and go, but the many doctors he of finding and describing many of the most fas-
consulted had no answers. In 2010, Hammond cinating studies. For example, a 1999 study of a
learned that the scrap metal used to produce type of heart failure that sometimes kills young
molten steel at the time of his industry involve- athletes revealed that the thirteen patients had,
ment contained mercury and that he undoubt- on average, levels of mercury in their hearts that
edly had inhaled mercury vapor on the job. The were twenty-two thousand times higher than
mercury deposited in his body and brain fol- those in the control group. Although the qual-
lowing this thirty-year-old workplace exposure ity of research on mercury varies somewhat, its
could explain his ongoing illness. very existence is remarkable, considering how
Guided by books by Andrew Cutler and difficult this broad-spectrum, chronic toxicant
a related Internet forum, Hammond got tested is to study in humans—and how little attention
for mercury and undertook low, frequent-dose mercury gets from mainstream medicine.
oral chelation. Both are complicated, contro- Some of the book’s most poignant sections
versial and fraught with potential missteps. relate to mercury’s subtle but reproducible ef-
However, Hammond’s treatise—published a fects on emotion and personality. Hammond
mere three years after he learned of his likely mentions his own increasing introversion and
occupational exposure to mercury—walks care- quotes German chemist Alfred Stock (1876- Hammond
fully through this minefield, presenting “science 1946), who wrote of his mercury-related describes
and case histories showing the role of mercury withdrawal from social activity. The Internet
in diseases…and how to eliminate mercury is crowded with dental amalgam sufferers who mercury’s
from [the] body.” In fact, Mercury Poisoning describe feelings of alienation, irritability and power to
may be the simplest and most accurate guide social withdrawal. (Note: See discussion of cause acute
to mercury toxicity available, offering a go-to mercury-induced changes in brain connectivity
resource for practitioners and patients who seek by Kern and others in this issue.) and chronic
to understand complex illnesses that may have A particularly useful chapter explains why toxicity that
a mercury component. one cannot simply interpret hair test results at manifests
Hammond describes mercury’s power to face value. When levels of toxic elements (toxic
cause acute and chronic toxicity that manifests metals) are low but levels of essential elements in an
in an astonishing variety of symptoms. He also (essential minerals) appear “deranged” (either astonishing
discusses mercury’s many commercial uses abnormally high or low), this is a hallmark of variety of
(either currently or until recently) and how these mercury toxicity. This disruption of mineral
have led to widespread exposures from dental transport, along with mercury’s ability to block symptoms.

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