Sciencemadness Discussion Board

ClO2 as a health product

Adi - 13-2-2008 at 02:28

Does anyone know how to make: ClO2 (not ClO2-) from NaClO2 ?

What happens if you mix NaClO2 with H2O and H3O+ (acid)?

[Edited on 13-2-2008 by Adi]

[Edited on 13-2-2008 by Adi]

not_important - 13-2-2008 at 02:52

http://www.sabretechservices.com/clo2/generation.asp

Nicodem - 13-2-2008 at 13:01

Quote:
Originally posted by Adi
What happens if you mix NaClO2 with H2O and H3O+ (acid)?

The HClO<sub>2</sub> forms only intermediately. It soon disproportionates to more stabile chlorous oxides and/or acids (equilibrating with the ratio depending on the pH). Of course, if you use a reducible acid a redox reaction occurs instead (for example, if you use HCl you get Cl<sub>2</sub> as the end product).

Adi - 13-2-2008 at 14:17

Thanks!

There is a health cult that drinks a mix made in the following way:

10g sodium chlorite is dissolved in 25 ml warm water

Add 15 drops from this mix in ½ a teaspoon of vinegar. Mix and wait three minutes.
Add ½ glass of apple juice.

Anyone can figure out what is in the glass of apple juice mix?



[Edited on 14-2-2008 by Adi]

garage chemist - 13-2-2008 at 14:30

This really damn stupid. NaClO2 is classified as "toxic" (skull and crossbones symbol) in the EU and for this reason is illegal to acquire for individuals via mail order (this also applies to things like NaNO2. Yes, those laws are bad for amateur chemists.).
Drinking the stuff seems very irresponsible.

Adding a non-reducing strong acid, like H2SO4, to NaClO2 produces pure ClO2 gas since the HClO2 disproportionates to ClO2 and HClO3. Acetic acid is likely not strong enough for this.

[Edited on 13-2-2008 by garage chemist]

Adi - 13-2-2008 at 15:01

Aha,, but what does the Acetic acid do then?

Well they claim very good results with a number of diseases and have had many succesfuld trials in Africa.

ClO2 is used in water cleaning because it kills everything. They claim that the immune system somehow can use the substance without harm to the body. Look it up, they call it MMS: Miracle Mineral Supplement .

It can’t be that harmful in small doses since it is sold as pills to purify water for drinking:

http://xrl.us/bf6p6

http://www.nextag.com/chlorine-dioxide/

see also:

http://www.purate.com



[Edited on 14-2-2008 by Adi]

12AX7 - 13-2-2008 at 16:51

Bollocks; ClO2 is as corrosive and reactive as Cl2, NO2 and other related oxidizers, if not more so. The reason it's healthy in water is because it kills everything in the water, just as it can kill you!

Tim

UnintentionalChaos - 13-2-2008 at 17:42

What about when it hits HCl in your stomach? That's a strong enough acid, I would think. This is just as stupid, but probably stupider, as using 35% H2O2 as an oral supplement because your blood needs more oxygen in it...of course they only reccomend a drop or two a day...I figure that's relatively harmless and it gives me a source of H2O2.

The_Davster - 13-2-2008 at 19:34

7% sodium chlorite is available in camping stores here, and its intention is to be added to potentially contaminated groundwater (as encountered while hiking for drinking purposes), a few drops of dilute HCl added, the water allowed to sit, and then the water drunk. It cannot be completly toxic , or it would not be allowed to be sold in Canada, and I have used it for its intended purpose without feeling any sickness at all.

10g on the other hand....to ingest such would be very foolish.

MagicJigPipe - 13-2-2008 at 23:08

Since when has something being toxic prevented it from being ingested? Many drugs are more "toxic" than sodium chlorite. I mean, it only takes .04g of oxymorphone or .5mg of fentanyl to kill a man (sometimes less) yet these are ingested by millions of people, everyday.

Just think of the other "toxins" that people ingest on a daily basis, sometimes without even knowing it; Ethanol, methanol, sodium fluoride, hypochlorite, chloramines, lead compounds, chlorinated organics, sodium benzoate etc...

Of course, the quantity of these compounds ingested makes all the difference, therefore, I would not doubt that sodium chlorite is or could be used as medicine, regardless of whether or not it is effective. Toxicity of larger amounts of the pure compound is sometimes irrelevant. No?

Adi - 14-2-2008 at 08:13

I guess medicine is often toxic or it would not have an effect. The point with taking something as "heavy" as ClO2 or ClO2- is (I guess) because it can kill viruses, fungi, bacteria etc in the body that otherwise could be very hard to get rid of. This, it seem, is for some reason possible without harming the body (too much?). According to the papers I have, it has already cured hundreds from malaria and even people with AIDS have experienced great results. Of course we don’t want to believe this at first and maybe it’s not true. But then again, I feel I have to look into it and find out for myself.

That’s why I start out here, trying to find out what is in the MMS.

By the way nobody drinks or eats 10g NaClO2. They only drink a few drops (15 or so) from a mixture made by dissolving NaClO2 in water, then taking the 15 drops from that mix and adding some vinegar and apple juice.

If anyone want, I can send some material to your email address.


A.
cand. scient.
Conceptdeveloper

[Edited on 14-2-2008 by Adi]

not_important - 14-2-2008 at 09:17

Quote:
Originally posted by Adi
... because it can kill viruses, fungi, bacteria etc in the body that otherwise could be very hard to get rid of. This, it seem, is for some reason possible without harming the body (too much?)...


Heating those to red heat kills them too, yet nobody suggests heating themselves that hot to kill diseases. Compounds like ClO2 are toxic to microorganisms because it is toxic to most life in general. It chemically attacks cells, damaging them. In a container of water being purified, the microorganisms are one of the main things around for the ClO2 to react with. However in your body the main stuff for ClO2 to react with is you, the diseases are only present in trace amounts.

Strong oxidisers like ClO2 are rather indiscriminate in their actions, unlike standard antibiotics.

The apple juice added may reduct the toxicity by reacting with the ClO2 before it is drunk.

Most 'germs' are prokaryotes, malaria is a protozoa and thus a eukaryote like you, AIDS is a virus. Protozoa infections are more difficult to treat than prokaryote ones, their makeup and metabolism is much more closely related to humans than bacteria are. Fungi are even more closely related eukaryotes, and are even more difficult to treat if internal to the body.

I would need strong evidence that any substance can selectively target disease organisms without also attacking cells in your body, including the wandering single cells making up your blood. That this agent is supposed to selectively attack both unwanted prokaryotes and eukaryotes, and virii on top of that. That's three major divisions of life, if you wish to call virii alive, and is quite a good trick.

Quote:
If anyone want, I can send some material to your email address.


On this board it is considered proper form to present data in public, this isn't a political action committee.

MagicJigPipe - 14-2-2008 at 10:41

Well, you must not be a big fan of chemotherapy because it partially relies on the very principles you speak harshly of. I suppose the goals of "chemical" treatment of disease are to do more damage to the disease than to the body and to not irreversibly harm or kill the person receiving treatment.

I would have to agree however, that chlorite seems like it would be too indiscriminent to be used in such a way. Maybe it's psychosematic, like many drugs.

Nicodem - 14-2-2008 at 10:53

Quote:
Originally posted by not_important
The apple juice added may reduct the toxicity by reacting with the ClO2 before it is drunk.

Actually, I think all of ClO2 would get reduced in a couple of second when added to apple juice. Some residual Cl2 and HClO might survive long enough as to get to the stomach. The most toxins you get by such a process are the chlorinated organics, some of which might also be carcinogenic.

Is this "treatment" some new New age cult? It sounds pretty crazy and stupid for being a religious healing. Can't these patients stick to some innocuous homeopathy, prayers or other such classical stuff?

microcosmicus - 14-2-2008 at 11:43

I think it's important to distinguish here between something a healthy person
would be doing on a daily basis as opposed to something for special circumstances.
In the case of emergency water purification, the damage done by ingesting a
little poison once or twice is outwieghed by the possibility of getting sick from
contaminated water, especially during an emergency or when stuck out in the middle
of nowhere, With chemothrapy, one is already sick and, if the best one can do is
a medicine which is equally toxic to diseased and healthy tissue, that may be better
than doing nothing and letting the disease run its course. However, it is a different
matter when it comes to routinely disinfecting water for daily use. I would not
particularly care to add strong oxidizers or the like on an ongoing basis, rather
I would disinfect the water by heating it or using UV light. If nothing else, I like
my water to taste like water as opposed to reeking with halogens --- nothing quite like
the refreshing sensation of freshly melted ice or distilled water.

not_important - 14-2-2008 at 20:31

Quote:
cause it partially relies on the very principles you speak harshly of. I suppose the goals of "chemical" treatment of disease are to do more damage to the disease than to the body and to not irreversibly harm or kill the person receiving treatment.


Chemo, in cancer treatment, depends upon metabolic differences between cell types within the same organism. For fast growing cancers it's a bit like I sitting in a chair reading while you're running on a treadmill in the same room, and carbon monoxide gets pumped through for a short period. I may get a headache, but you'll be in much worse shape.

Most antibiotics depend on metabolic or other differences between different organisms.

Anti-virials often disrupt some part of the RNA/DNA replication, protein making, or virus assembly. That's tricky and the host organism is often interfered with too, but survives through the shear number of cells and differing timescales. The fact the virus is hidden within host cells makes it difficult, some bacteria do the same thing.

And, yes, for all of those the host usually is harmed to some degree or other as well.

ClO2 is primarily an oxidiser, rather non-specific. It will attack anything organic, virii, prokaryotes, eukaryotes. There are likely differences between those kingdoms, cells wall chemistry for example, but not that much. And certainly not for differing eukaryotes. That ClO2 functions as a broad-band anti "bad cell" agent would need some pretty well done experiments with solid results to convince me.

The use of chlorites to purify water is something else entirely, just as is boiling the water. No one suggests to kill diseases within the body by boiling the person, but some people made the leap from water treatment to magic antibiotic in the case of ClO2.

MagicJigPipe - 14-2-2008 at 21:29

Yeah, it's like trying to drink enough ethanol to kill microorganisms in the body. Ha! It would work, but the EtOH concentration would kill. I suppose that's the same thing with chlorite and radiation. Only difference is radiation can be directed. Bleach is a great disinfectant but I wouldn't recommend drinking a bunch of it nor would I suspect drinking a little here and there would have any health benefits aside from water disinfection.

Chlorite...Hypochlorite. Same principle with both in my opinion.

12AX7 - 14-2-2008 at 21:41

Quote:
Originally posted by Adi
By the way nobody drinks or eats 10g NaClO2. They only drink a few drops (15 or so) from a mixture made by dissolving NaClO2 in water, then taking the 15 drops from that mix and adding some vinegar and apple juice.


If it's diluted by drops of diluted drops, then that's just homeopathy sillyness. (Why use such a big dosage anyway if it's just being diluted? Why not use a small, appropriately sized dosage? Oh...it's homeopathy...)

Tim

not_important - 14-2-2008 at 22:18

I don't think that is meant as a double dilution, but rather a redundant use of the amount.

This appears to be known as <reverb>Miracle Mineral Supplement</reverb>

http://www.thebluevalley.co.nz/
http://www.miraclemineralsolutions.com/

The explanation of how MMS functions is ... interesting.

microcosmicus - 15-2-2008 at 08:44

Reading what those Miracle Mineral fellows have to say in their F.A.Q., the only purpose of the
apple juice is to hide the awful taste of the stuff. As not_important points out, this is definitely not
homeopathic. Rather, the intent of this is to get a good dose of ClO2 into the body where
it lingers around for hours in the bloodstream destroying all sorts of microbes (including
blood cells). Their main claim is that NaClO2 being so cheap, and so effective against germs,
why spend so much on medicine. Well, the problem with that line of reasoning was adequately
critiqued above. They also claim success against malaria.

However, the thing which might be most relevant here is their storefront:

http://www.orders92.com/ProductInfo.aspx?productid=385

They sell 4 oz. of 28% NaOCl2 solution for $20. Maybe this could be added to the list of readily available chemicals.

Looking around a bit, I also found some other places which sell this:
http://mmsmiracle.com/sage
http://www.ener-chi.com/mms.htm
http://cgi.ebay.com/MMS--MIRACLE-MINERAL-SUPPLEMENT-original...
http://www.themmsexperience.com.au/

The last site also has a colorful description of oxidation reactions:
"When a chlorine dioxide ion contacts a harmful pathogen, it instantly rips up to five electrons from the pathogen, in what can be likened to a microscopic explosion… harmless to us, but terminal for pathogens. The pathogen – an electron donor – is rendered harmless due to the involuntary surrendering of its electrons to the chlorine dioxide – an electron acceptor – and the resulting release of energy. Oxidized by the chlorine ion, the former pathogen becomes a harmless salt."

Their claim of why this is good for you is founded on the premise that
healthy cells are alkaline but unhealthy cells and pathogens are acidic.
As a general statement, this is nuts. On a smaller scale, inaccuracies
such as describing the metabolism of ClO2 as taking place by
oxidizing it (to what? chlorate?) undermine my confidence in these
people.

[Edited on 15-2-2008 by microcosmicus]

woelen - 15-2-2008 at 15:07

I found a source for sodium chlorite, 1 liter 30% solution for only EUR 14+shipping. Only useful for mainland Europe members, not for overseas countries. I don't post the source here (the source has too many other, more k3wl-sensitive chemicals, that's why I don't post it here). If interested send a U2U.

Please use it for chemistry experiments only and do not try to poison yourself :P.