Tackling the Different Types of Toxins and Their Effects on You: Discovering the toxic effects of heavy metals, Studying bacteria, viruses, yeasts, and parasites, Turning a critical eye on medications and Getting a feel for how toxins can affect you.

Tackling the Different Types of Toxins and Their Effects on You

In This Chapter

▶ Discovering the toxic effects of heavy metals

▶ Studying bacteria, viruses, yeasts, and parasites

▶ Turning a critical eye on medications

▶ Getting a feel for how toxins can affect you

What’s the first step for waging a war against toxins and their harmful effects on your body? Know thy enemy. You can’t make a concerted effort to cleanse your body of toxins or avoid contact with them in the first place if you don’t understand what they are, where they come from, and what they can do to your body. That’s what this chapter is all about.

The current presence of toxins is overwhelming. Toxic sources are ubiquitous in our everyday lives, and the effects on your body’s complex systems can be devastating. Some of the sources will surprise you; I bet you’re familiar with the dangers of lead paint, but how about the presence of arsenic in the treated lumber you used to build your deck, or the antimony in your baby’s bedding? I devote a good portion of this chapter to identify- ing common toxins that we’re exposed to every day, so you can understand what’s out there and how it could be entering your body.

Humans have some built-in mechanisms that help to rid our bodies of foreign materials that occur commonly in nature. But because dangerous manmade chemicals have become more abundant only in the last 100 years or so, we’re not equipped to deal with their threats to our health. These toxins put a serious strain on our natural detoxification mechanisms and can eventually exhaust and overwhelm them. Toxins can damage many of our other sys- tems, as well.

Exploring the Various Types of Toxins

The range of toxic materials that surrounds you every day of your life is dizzying. For the purposes of this book, a toxin is any substance that has harmful effects on human biochemistry or tissue. Keep in mind that some chemicals that are usually helpful to us actually become toxic if we get too much of them; vitamin D is an example.

Because the term toxin can be used to describe so many different substances, it can sometimes be difficult to focus on the specific toxins that you should be aware of while working toward detoxifying your body. In this section, I fill you in on many of the most dangerous toxic materials that you’re likely to face on a regular basis — toxins that are very common and also very harmful.

When most people start thinking about toxins, their minds jump immediately to nasty chemicals. They think about smokestacks spewing poisonous gases into the atmosphere and rusty pipes pouring sludge into a nearby stream. But that isn’t the whole picture. Don’t get me wrong: Plenty of industrial byproducts and other manmade toxins pose a threat to the wellbeing of millions. But when you’re considering the range of toxins, you should also keep in mind things like bacteria and viruses, or even medical materials like chemotherapy drugs.

I cover most of the major types of toxins in this section, so read on to dis- cover the toxins that can creep in silently around you and jeopardize your good health. I also offer some brief insight on what each of these toxins can do to your body, and if you find yourself wanting to know more about toxic effects you can skip ahead to the next section of this chapter.

As you read, you’ll probably want to know what you can do to limit your exposure to toxins. Feel free to flip ahead to Chapter 3, which features infor- mation on how to dodge toxins. And if you’re eager to know whether or not you have dangerously high levels of these toxins in your body, check out the details on getting tested for toxins (by a doctor) in Chapter 5.

Feeling the weight of heavy metals

Heavy metal doesn’t just refer to music with blaring electric guitars and thunderous drum solos. The heavy metals I describe over the course of the next few pages can be found virtually anywhere, and they have an extremely toxic effect on the human body.

Heavy metals feature a chemical structure that causes them to harm the human body’s normal (and complex) chemical processes. These metals occur naturally in the earth, but they’re usually present in very low levels and rarely cause problems for people in those forms. The real trouble begins when heavy metals are used commercially and end up in concentrated amounts in the goods that we purchase, bring into our homes, and incorporate in our everyday lives.

Read on to get a feel for the most widespread and dangerous heavy metals.

Mercury

With the exception of plutonium (which is radioactive), mercury is the most toxic substance on earth for humans. Just one one-thousandth of a gram is toxic, and hundreds of tons of mercury are released into our environment every year in the United States alone. Mercury is a known toxin for nerves and contributes to a wide range of ailments from autism to Alzheimer’s to decreased fertility. Estimates from clinical evaluations show that one in eight women have dangerously high mercury levels. Mercury is transferred from mother to fetus during pregnancy, which may help explain why one in six children today has neuropsychological problems. Not only is mercury highly toxic, but it’s also very tough to eliminate from the body. Natural removal is so slow that after one exposure it takes 15 to 30 years for half the mercury to be eliminated.

You can be exposed to mercury through several different sources, and the following are among the most common:

✓ Dental fillings: The “silver” or amalgam fillings that dentists use to fill cavities are 50 percent mercury. That mercury gradually seeps out of the fillings and into your body. The American Dental Association insists that the mercury is bound to other metals and doesn’t typically enter the body, but multiple studies have shown otherwise. In fact, many European countries have banned the use of amalgam fillings in children and women of childbearing age. If that doesn’t turn you off to the use of these types of fillings, consider that when dentists receive the mate- rial used to make the fillings it comes in packaging made for hazardous materials, and when the fillings are removed dentists must dispose of the remnants using toxic waste procedures! In my opinion, you should completely avoid amalgam fillings, and if you already have them you should consider having them removed. If that’s the case, be sure to find a biomedical dentist who knows how to take out the fillings safely, using a rubber dam and a high speed vacuum.

✓ Coal: The coal that’s mined and burned to generate electricity contains mercury. Coal-burning power plants release thousands of pounds of mercury into the atmosphere each year. Many of the world’s quickly developing countries, including China, are building coal-burning plants at an incredible rate, so the amount of mercury released into our air is getting higher all the time. The technology to remove the mercury from power plant byproducts exists, but it’s an added expense that would cut into power company profits.

✓ High fructose corn syrup (HFCS): High fructose corn syrup is one of the most common sugar substitutes used today, and one of the first steps in making HFCS involves soaking corn in a solution that contains mercury. That mercury can end up in the foods you eat that contain HFCS. A recent study by the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy showed that when HFCS was the first or second ingredient listed, half the processed food samples they tested contained mercury.

✓ Fish: Mercury from a huge range of sources eventually ends up in bodies of water across the globe, and as a result it also ends up in fish. The problem has swelled dramatically in the past decade, leading the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to release multiple warnings about the dangers of eating fish and shellfish, especially for children and pregnant women. The FDA issued a public warning in 2001 with an update in 2004 that stated that if a pregnant woman eats a single 3-ounce portion of swordfish, shark, tile fish, king mackerel, or tuna, she will ingest enough mercury to damage the brain of her fetus.

Educate yourself about the mercury-related risks associated with eating fish and shellfish by visiting www.epa.gov/waterscience/fish/ publicinfo.html.

✓ Fluorescent lightbulbs: Many homes and businesses have been switching to fluorescent lightbulbs to help cut down on energy use, but that news isn’t all good. Fluorescent bulbs contain mercury, and if a bulb breaks you should treat the situation with extreme caution.

You can and should read the EPA’s suggestions for cleaning up a broken fluorescent lightbulb at this Web site: www.epa.gov/hg/spills/.

Mercury can also be found in flu vaccines; flip ahead a few pages in this chapter to read all about those potential threats.

Lead

The toxicity of lead has been recognized for many years, but the widespread use of the metal throughout history means that we’ll be forced to deal with lead and its health consequences for the foreseeable future. Federal legislation was enacted in the 1970s to remove lead from paint and fuel, and many people assume that lead levels have dwindled as a result. That’s simply not the case because lead doesn’t go away — it’s a very persistent material.

Lead poisoning causes many health problems, including damage to neurological systems. The developing brains and nervous systems of children can be severely harmed if their lead levels are too high.

Most children today are tested for lead poisoning, but the vast majority of those tests are based on blood samples. Blood tests reveal elevated lead levels in the blood. Here’s the problem: Lead is absorbed by brain and other tissues, and blood tests aren’t as good at registering high lead levels in the brain. Plus, blood tests reveal only very recent exposure. Luckily, other tests can more accurately detect overall lead levels; to read all about them, flip ahead to Chapter 5.

What are the major sources of lead toxicity today? Lead can be found in all sorts of places, including the following:

✓ Lead paint: Most of the paint used on homes prior to 1960 contained dangerously high levels of lead, and lead was still present in paints used on homes up to the late 1970s. Some estimates indicate that 10 million pounds of lead are still on painted surfaces in the United States. As many as 6 million homes, which house about 2 million children, have surfaces covered in paint that includes lead.

When you think of lead paint, you may think only about painted interior and exterior walls of old houses. Unfortunately, that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Lead paint can be used on all kinds of surfaces, and believe it or not lead is still used in some paints today. Although it seems unthink- able, some toy manufacturers still use lead paint on toys, even though it’s illegal. To get a feel for the scope of this problem, run a search for “toy hazard recalls” on the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission’s Web site (www.cpsc.gov).

✓ Water supplies: Some older homes have plumbing that includes lead or lead soldering. That lead can leach into your drinking water, and the problem is more common than you may think. Some researchers indicate that as many as 16 percent of household water supplies have dangerous concentrations of lead.

✓ Other sources: Millions of tons of lead are produced every year for industrial and commercial uses, and the toxin ends up in many items.

For example, the glazing used on some types of pottery contains lead, and the supplies used in creating stained glass can be lead-rich, as well. And you know that antique lead crystal decanter that your grandmother passed down to you? It’s called lead crystal for a reason. Many candles also have lead core wicks.

For more information on lead and lead poisoning, visit the EPA’s lead informa- tion page at www.epa.gov/lead.

Aluminum

Aluminum is a toxic metal that serves absolutely no useful purpose in the human body. It’s also the most abundant metal in the earth’s crust. We all have some aluminum in our systems, but because it’s a toxin and can have some nasty effects on the body, you need to know where aluminum is commonly found. The following is a list of a few everyday items that are made of or can contain aluminum:

✓ Aluminum foil

✓ Antacids

✓ Antiperspirants

✓ Baking powder

✓ Bleached flour

✓ Cookware

✓ Municipal water supplies

✓ Toothpaste

The toxic effects of aluminum are well understood and are being studied more all the time. Aluminum has toxic effects on the brain. It would be next to impossible for you to completely curtail your intake of aluminum, but it certainly wouldn’t hurt you to limit your use of products that contain high amounts of the metal.

Some of the ailments that have been linked to higher-than-usual levels of aluminum include neurologic conditions similar to Alzheimer’s, colic, rickets, intestinal problems, extreme nervousness, anemia, headaches, memory loss, speech problems, and aching muscles.

Arsenic

Arsenic is an element that occurs naturally in soil, and the concentrations of arsenic existing in the environment vary from location to location. As with some of the other toxins described in this section, small amounts of naturally occur- ring arsenic are somewhat normal and don’t represent a serious health risk.

However, increased exposure to arsenic can have devastating effects on your body. Arsenic can cause intestinal problems, anemia, skin lesions, liver or kidney damage, and even death. The EPA has stated that arsenic can cause several types of cancer in humans. And a study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (a prestigious, widely respected medical journal) found an association between increased arsenic levels and type 2 diabetes in adults.

Arsenic and poultry farming

In recent years, the use of arsenic in poultry farming has become an increasing concern. The debate centers on an arsenic-based sub- stance called roxarsone, which is added to chicken feed to help cut down on parasites that live in chicken intestines. Several potential health issues can arise from that practice, the first of which being (of course) the presence of arsenic in chicken meat. A few years ago, the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP) tested 155 samples from uncooked supermarket chicken products and found detectable arsenic in more than half of the samples. The IATP also tested 90 fast food chicken products and found that all 90 contained detectable arsenic. The IATP cautions that its testing is by no means definitive, but the findings are troubling at best.

As a result of some of the public outcry over the use of roxarsone, several poultry producers have stopped using it. If you’re concerned about the issue, do some online research to find out which producers no longer use roxarsone. And you can always buy USDA certified 100 percent organic chicken; organic standards prohibit the use of arsenic-based substances.

Even more troubling could be what happens when the arsenic from roxarsone doesn’t get absorbed by chickens. In that case the arsenic passes out of the chicken in its feces, which is often used as an agricultural fertilizer. When the fertilizer is applied to fields, the arsenic can be washed away and find its way into ground- water, which is a common source of drinking water for many communities.

Clearly it’s in your best interest to limit your exposure to arsenic whenever you can, but how can you do that? The first step is to be mindful of where arsenic is present in your surroundings.

Arsenic compounds are used as wood preservatives, so many “pressure- treated” varieties of wood contain arsenic. These types of wood aren’t used for residential purposes as much now as they were in the past, but you can still easily find lumber that has been treated with arsenic compounds. Decks and outdoor children’s play sets are a couple of prime sources.

Arsenic is also used in paints, dyes, metals, drugs, soaps, and semiconduc- tors. It’s added to some fertilizers and animal feeding operations, which can increase the amount of arsenic in food.

Antimony

Antimony is a heavy metal that is used as a fire retardant in many fabrics. It’s also a potent toxin that can get into your bloodstream and then into your body’s tissues within two hours of exposure. Antimony accumulates in organs and even bone, and it can disrupt the way that your organs function, causing anorexia, fatigue, muscle pain, low blood pressure, fragile red blood cells, mental changes, and heart pain.

Where can antimony be found? You can find it in a variety of fire-retardant textiles: clothes, bedding, and carpet to name a few. It’s also present in solders, small arms ammunition, lead batteries, paints, enamels, glass, and pottery glazes.

The EPA doesn’t closely monitor environmental levels of antimony, so data on its prevalence is tough to come by.

Tin

Tin is another common heavy metal, and it often combines with other materi- als to form compounds. Some of these compounds are easily absorbed into the human body when tin is ingested (in food or water), and — fortunately — some of the other tin compounds are less likely to enter your system.

People inadvertently ingest tin in a number of different ways. You can take in tin if you eat or drink something that comes in a tin can that has a damaged liner, for example. Tin is also present in solder, in toothpastes that contain stannous fluoride (check for it in the ingredients list on your toothpaste package), and in other health and beauty products like soap and perfume.

You can also find tin compounds in things like rodent poison, fungicides, wood preservatives, herbicides, and sprays used to control mites and ticks.

Tin toxicity is very hard on the body, causing symptoms like brain swelling, headaches, visual defects, low blood sugar, and decreased immune function.

In addition to the metals I describe in this section, several others are less commonly encountered but can still cause serious problems. These metals include barium, bismuth, cadmium, platinum, thallium, tungsten, and uranium. If you’re getting tested for toxicity — read more about that in Chapter 5 — you may want to include tests for these metals just in case.

Living toxins: Getting toxic from the inside

As I mention at the start of this section, a toxin is any substance that has a harmful effect on human biochemistry or tissue. A common misconception is that only chemicals are toxins. There’s much more to the story than that.

Toxins can be living things, and it’s important that you consider — and act to prevent — the toxic effects of bacteria, viruses, yeast, and parasites.

Certain types of these four categories of living things can be a constant challenge to your body and can negatively affect your health just as much as some of the dangerous heavy metals.

Most of these living toxins enter your body through your mouth, nose, lungs, and stomach. Your immune system puts up a good fight, but it can be over- whelmed — especially if it has been weakened by other toxins along the way — and may not be able to tackle the challenges that some bacteria, viruses, yeast, and parasites present.

Bacteria

Bacteria are microscopic, single-celled organisms that live on our skin and inside our intestines. If they’re located anywhere else it’s called an infection, and the results are toxic. We’re covered inside and out with good bacteria that live with us, cleaning up our skin and intestinal tract. But if you get the wrong kind of bacteria in your intestines, the toxic effects can include the following:

✓ Abdominal cramping

✓ Body infection

✓ Constipation

✓ Diarrhea

✓ Foul-smelling stools

✓ Spastic colon

You can also experience neurological symptoms like fatigue, changes in mood, agitation, and decreased attention.

Viruses

Viruses are very basic living things that can reproduce and interact with your body’s cells. The types of viruses range from the virus that causes the common cold to the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). Viruses usually reproduce very rapidly, but your immune system (if it’s healthy) can kill most of them off.

The best way to defend your body against viruses and the toxic problems they cause is to maintain a robust immune system. Check out Chapter 10 for lots of useful information on how you can detoxify your body to help your immune system flourish.

Yeast

Yeasts are single-celled fungi, and they’re ever-present in our environment. There are plenty of good yeasts (as anyone enjoying a cold beer or a slice of bread can tell you), but some yeasts can act as toxins when present in your body in unusually high numbers. The yeast cells themselves aren’t necessarily toxic, but some of the substances produced by yeasts can cause a range of ailments. The more yeast cells living in your body, the more toxic substances are generated. Those toxins can cause the following ailments, among others:

✓ Gastrointestinal problems: Constipation, diarrhea, indigestion, cramping, excessive gas, heartburn, spastic colon, irritable bowel syndrome, colitis, and chronic gum inflammation

✓ Neurological problems: Fatigue, depression, psychosis, mood swings, insomnia, drunken feeling, hyperactivity, agitation, and decreased attention span

✓ Respiratory problems: Asthma, allergies, recurrent infections (sinusitis, tonsillitis, bronchitis), colds, and sore throat If your diet includes a lot of sugar, you’re probably nourishing the yeast cells you’re hosting and making it easier for them to live and reproduce. That’s not a good thing, and it’s one of many reasons to rein in the amount of sugar you eat on a daily basis.

Yeast-related problems commonly crop up after people take antibiotics. The powerful antibiotics used now are great at wiping out the bacteria that cause sickness, but there’s a downside: The harmless and good types of bacteria (the types that live in your intestines and aid digestion) get wiped out, too, and in their absence yeasts can grow and reproduce at rapid rates. That’s a big part of the reason that women often suffer vaginal yeast infections after taking rounds of antibiotics.

Parasites

Parasites are tiny creatures that live on or inside our bodies — freeloaders that feast on the nutrients we bring in and contribute absolutely nothing to our health or well-being. They range from worms (tapeworms and hookworms, not the worms that you used as fishing bait when you were little) to the critters that cause malaria. Many parasites set up shop in the intestines because that’s one of the best places to find a wide variety of available nutrients.

For centuries it was common for people to get a bowel cleanse or some other form of parasite removal once a year. (Perhaps you remember hearing your grandparents or great-grandparents talk about getting “wormed” — that’s the same thing.) Parasite cleanses, or techniques that help to rid the body of para- site invaders, are far less common now than they used to be, and in most cases that’s not necessarily a good thing. For details on how you can use some of these methods to keep parasites out of your system, flip to Chapter 10.

Swallowing the bitter pill: Toxins in medicines

Many of the toxins I explain in this chapter come from sources that aren’t surprising. It’s not really hard to believe that a massive coal-burning power plant, for instance, may be spewing some toxic materials out into the environment. But some toxins come from sources that most people think of as benign or even beneficial. One of the most surprising areas where toxins are becoming increasingly common is traditional medicine. Some of the treatments and drugs used to cure illnesses can actually cause quite a few others. The culprits range from vaccines to radiation, and I discuss several of them over the course of the next few pages.

Vaccines

Vaccines have been in the news a lot lately, and they likely will continue to be for quite some time. I want to start this explanation by stating that I don’t tell my patients to refrain from getting vaccines. Vaccinations can be a good thing, and it would be hard to refute the fact that some vaccines have helped to save many lives in the last 60 years. When my patients ask me about vaccines, I tell them that the best thing they can do is to get informed about the vaccinations they’re considering and make a decision that takes into consid- eration all the related risks and benefits.

That said, here are a few of the vaccines that have been under fire recently:

✓ Influenza vaccines: Commonly called flu shots, a number of vaccinations for the influenza virus are on the market today. Some of these vaccines include a chemical called thimerosal, which contains mercury. (Flip back a few pages in this chapter to read all about mercury.) Thimerosal is used as a preservative in these influenza vaccines, and it’s about half mercury, by weight.

The toxicity of the mercury in thimerisol is currently being debated, but no matter which side of the debate you fall on, here’s some good news: Some influenza vaccines do not contain thimerisol, so you have options if you want to get a flu shot but don’t want to also get a dose of mercury. The bad news is that mercury-free shots can be difficult to locate, and some doctors don’t know which type they have. In some states, the mercury-free versions are reserved for Medicaid patients.

The FDA has a lot of thimerosal information on its Web site, including a list that shows you some of the vaccines that do not contain the sub- stance. Check out www.fda.gov/cber/vaccine/thimerosal.htm.

✓ Diphtheria, tetanus, and pertussis (DTP) vaccines: Many forms of the DTP vaccine, which is commonly given to infants, contain both aluminum and formaldehyde. Some people argue that the amounts of these toxins in the vaccine are minimal and don’t cause any problems; others contend that the substances are dangerous no matter how small the amount.

✓ Polio vaccines: Many of the polio vaccines made today are processed through the cells of Green Monkey kidneys. In previous decades, monkey viruses have contaminated polio vaccine doses, and those doses were given to the general public before the virus was discovered. Many researchers claim that the problem is behind us, but some scientists believe we still need to be concerned.

✓ Hepatitis B vaccines: Most of the controversy surrounding vaccines for hepatitis B centers on the use of the vaccine in children. U.S. government data has shown that children under the age of 14 are as much as three times more likely to suffer adverse effects from the hepatitis B vaccine as they are to catch the disease in the absence of a vaccination.

Some of the questions that have been raised about the safety of vaccines can make some people roll their eyes, but the fact is that many of the questions are justified and require quite a bit more research. To get a feel for how serious some of these questions may be, consider the following quote, which is taken from a statement that Dr. Jane Orient, the executive director of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons at the time, presented to a Congressional subcommittee in 1999:

Public policy regarding vaccines is fundamentally flawed. It is permeated by conflicts of interest. It is based on poor scientific methodology (including studies that are too small, too short, and too limited in populations rep- resented), which is, moreover, insulated from independent criticism. The evidence is far too poor to warrant overriding the independent judgments of patients, parents, and attending physicians, even if this were ethically or legally acceptable.

If you’re thinking about getting vaccines for you or your family, make sure you have a candid conversation with a doctor who will listen to your concerns about the risks associated with the vaccinations you’re considering.

Chemotherapy

Chemotherapy (also called chemo) is a treatment for cancer that uses a com- bination of drugs to kill or slow the growth of cancerous cells. It can be a very useful way to fight some cancers, but the drugs used are effectively toxins. The side effects of chemo can be extremely uncomfortable or painful and can include hair loss, abdominal pain, weakening of the bones, and even cancer.

Even at its best, chemo is very hard on the body, but it can be made less of a burden if a patient’s diet and nutrition are healthy before and during the treatment. Patients who have taken care to eat a healthy diet — the kind of diet I trumpet throughout this book, particularly in Chapter 7 — generally experience less severe chemotherapy side effects than those who have poor eating habits.

If you’re facing a fight against cancer and you have to decide whether or not to proceed with chemotherapy, make sure you have an extensive conversation with your doctor about the effectiveness of chemo treatment on the specific type of cancer in question. Some types of cancer can be treated extremely effectively with chemo, but other types don’t respond nearly as well. For example, if a certain kind of cancer has a five-year survival rate with chemo treatment and a four-year survival rate without chemo, you may want to con- sider other ways to treat the cancer. On the other hand, chemotherapy can provide a 90 percent cure rate for some types of cancer.

Radiation

Like chemotherapy, the use of radiation in modern medicine is focused on treating cancer patients. And as with chemo, radiation can be a very necessary evil if you have a cancer fight on your hands.

Radiation treatment involves pointing an ionizing radiation beam at a mass of cancer cells in order to kill the targeted tissue (usually a cancerous tumor). The beam is moved around a focal point in the tumor so that the surrounding tissue receives only a small amount of radiation while the target area is hit hard with the radiation.

Radiation therapy has made terrific strides in recent years, but the process still has a toxic effect on the healthy tissues that surround the cancerous cells. As you’d guess, the healthier the tissue, the less likely it will be dam- aged by the radiation. And what’s the best way to build healthy tissues in your body? That’s right — stay away from toxins and eat a healthy diet that focuses on the right (toxin-free) foods.

If you’re going to have radiation therapy, do some research on hyperbaric oxygen therapy, which can reduce the damage to your body from radiation.

Exploring the Effects of Toxins

In the previous sections of this chapter, I offer some basic information on how various toxins can harm your body and its many complex systems. It’s always good to be familiar with the havoc that a particular toxin can wreak on you, but I think it’s also very useful for you to understand some of the more general problems that toxins can cause. The toxic problem in our world is a big one, and you can get a feel for the scope of the issue if you take a step back and view it through a wide-angle lens. That’s the point of this section: to clue you in on the broad range of awful effects that toxins can have.

Some toxins affect the body by modifying its natural chemical balance, causing certain systems to break down. Others are less sneaky and can flat-out kill some body tissues. Still other toxins actually alter our genetic material, causing devastating problems like birth defects. I explore all these possible effects in this section.

Cellular damage

The most basic type of harm that toxins can cause you is cellular damage. (No, I’m not talking about what happens when you accidentally drop your cell phone on the sidewalk. This is much more serious stuff.) We are all made of cells, and toxins have a very nasty habit of changing the proteins and other materials in our cells, to the point where a cell’s basic functions can be altered or stopped completely.

Some people hear about the basics of cellular damage and think, What’s the big deal? Cells are so small, and I’ve got trillions of ’em! If a little bit of mercury kills off a few cells, I’ll be fine.

The problem is that when toxins have a negative effect at the cellular level, the scope of the harm done can snowball very quickly. If many cells are damaged, it doesn’t take long for an entire section of tissue to fail. If that failure is bad enough, it can jeopardize the health of one of your organs. And when an organ is in trouble, it won’t be long until your whole body is in serious danger.

Nerve damage

Nerve tissue — the stuff that makes up your brain, spinal cord, and all your nerves — is very delicate, and it’s subject to damage from incredibly small amounts of toxins. The toxins in some insecticides, for example, can cause brain damage in a matter of hours from just a single exposure. Or take some of the heavy metal toxins I describe earlier in this chapter. If you have an acute exposure to one of those substances, or even many small exposures over a long period of time, you can easily end up with damage to your ner- vous system that extends from your brain to your spinal cord to the nerves that spread out throughout the rest of your body.

Some research even argues that conditions affecting the nervous system — Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, and multiple sclerosis are just three examples — can be partially caused or accelerated by heavy metals and other chemicals that cause toxic nerve damage. As with many medical debates, there are sup- porters with considerable evidence on both sides of that conversation, and additional studies that will help to shed light on the issue are being published all the time. But there is no question that heavy metals cause nerve damage.

Intestinal complications

You may not think very highly of your intestinal tract, especially if you’ve had any encounters with a spicy habanero enchilada lately, but your intestines really are marvelous, complicated things. The processes that take place in your intestines are absolutely vital to your health, and keeping that part of your body in tip-top shape can go a long way toward boosting your overall health. Unfortunately, many of the toxins to which we’re exposed every day can have an incredibly negative effect on your intestines.

Any unhealthy, unnatural thing (read: toxin) that you eat or drink that isn’t broken down in your mouth or stomach can cause irritation or inflammation of the intestines. When your intestines get inflamed, the result may be diarrhea, which is one way that your body tries to rid itself of toxic materials. If the inflammation persists, the intestines will slow down their function, and constipation is the result.

Many people try to override the diarrhea part of the process by taking medicines, but that’s not always the best route. After all, your body could simply be trying to clear out a substance that doesn’t belong. Before you reach for the antidiarrheal medicine to help solve a minor case of diarrhea, consider the option of drinking plenty of water and enduring the problem to give your body the chance to rid itself of a potentially harmful substance.

Chronic inflammation of the intestines due to toxins can also cause a condition called leaky gut syndrome. Leaky gut syndrome isn’t often recognized by doctors of traditional medicine, but a growing amount of evidence supports the theory behind the condition. With leaky gut syndrome, your intestines aren’t able to maintain a proper barrier between the contents of your intestine and your bloodstream. Materials that should remain in your intestines pass through into your bloodstream, and food allergies and other ailments may result.

Fat cell accumulation

One of the body’s mechanisms for dealing with toxins (read all about those mechanisms in Chapter 4) is to store the toxins in fat cells. That works out only if the toxin in question is fat-soluble, meaning that its chemical makeup allows it to be stored in fat. When your body sticks a toxin in a fat cell, the fat cell tries to get bigger in order to decrease the concentration of the newly introduced toxic substance. And what happens when your fat cells increase in size? Fat is accumulated, and you gain weight. This process is part of the reason that people suffer from obesity, which of course is a problem of epidemic proportions in the United States, costing us billions of dollars every year.