When you are prescribed an often-used antibiotic, you take the medication, hoping it will kill a bacteria that’s infecting you. You might expect some digestive problems with antibiotics – but tendon and muscle damage doesn’t enter your head – and unfortunately doesn’t enter the heads of most doctors! That is why I feel updating my 2011 article, Magnesium Helps Heal Cipro Damage, is so important. You need this information to make informed health decision for you and your loved ones!
Perhaps you will recognize these circumstances, shared in one of the emails I received:
I just wanted to thank you for giving me my life back. In December 2008 I had a bladder infection and was given Cipro. On the medication I actually felt worse and mid-course was switched to a different antibiotic. The muscle pain was intolerable and the trouble with urination seemed to worsen.
Long story short and six different antibiotics along with another round of Cipro over a period of two months, I had so much groin and hip pain, I was unable to walk. It felt like my insides were tearing with each step. For two years through extensive testing with blood work, CT, MRI, and x-ray, the doctors could not determine the cause. I was diagnosed with Dysesthesia and put on anti-inflammatory drugs, and sent to Physical Therapy. PT changed nothing.
I personally took charge and headed off to an Acupuncturist, and private Yoga lessons. This helped, but still walking was unbearable at times. Not being satisfied with my diagnosis, I was constantly researching.
When my mother had a similar experience with Cipro, I began researching the side effects and came to believe it was the culprit all along affecting my muscles.
When An Antiobiotic Turns Toxic
As early as the late 1990s, the damaging effects of a family of antibiotics called, “fluoroquinolones” were described. For example, a 2018 article in Nature reported widespread accounts of people having negative side effects from taking fluoroquinolones:
In 1998, US journalist Stephen Fried (now at Columbia Journalism School in New York) published a book called Bitter Pills about his wife’s severe and long-lasting neurological reaction to ofloxacin. It helped to trigger a wave of reports on websites such as the Quinolone Antibiotics Adverse Reaction Forum, which by 2001 hosted more than 5,000 posts. The late Jay Cohen, then a psychiatrist and medical researcher at the University of California, San Diego, contacted patients through the sites and published 45 case studies1. Cohen warned that after taking fluoroquinolones, some people had developed serious problems in multiple organs. These effects came on rapidly and lasted for months or years.
So, in 2008 the FDA put a black box warning on this family of drugs, warning doctors and patients of the raised risk of tendonitis and tendon rupture causing long-term disability.
Here is a more complete list of side effects:
Tendonitis, Tendon Rupture, Tendon, Ligament, Joint and Muscle Damage, Vision Damage, Hearing Loss, Taste Perversion, Peripheral Neuropathy (Tingling, burning sensation), Insomnia, Nightmares, Anxiety Attacks, Depersonalization, Cognitive Disorders, Brain, Heart, Liver, Kidney, Pancreas, Blood and Endocrine Disorders, Severe Psychotic Reactions, Suicidal Thoughts or Actions Gastrointestinal Damage.
The Problem with the Fluoride-Magnesium Interaction
Since I wrote my original Cipro article for Natural News, I have refined my views on why Cipro and other fluoroquinolones are a problem. So, I now warn people that fluoride is in about 50% of prescribed drugs making them extra toxic in they way they disrupt magnesium biological processes. I now would like to emphasize and comment on the challenges created by the Fluoride-Magnesium Interaction:
- “Fluoride ion clearly interferes with the biological activity of magnesium ion.” And since magnesium does so much in the body, the side effects are often too widespread to recognize or even quantify.
- “One of the prime locations of possible fluoride (F) and magnesium (Mg) interactions is the intestines. The increased F supply reduces intestinal Mg resorption, owing to high chemical affinity of both elements and production of MgF+ and MgF2.” When I read this, I realized that’s another reason why ReMag in it’s Pico-Ionic form works so well because it’s absorbed directly into the cells and doesn’t reach the intestines and therefore is not inhibited in its activity by fluoride.
- “The toxic effect of fluoride ion plays a key role in acute Mg deficiency.” This means if someone is already magnesium deficient, fluoride toxicity is more pronounced. That’s why some people are damaged by the antibiotic Cipro and others aren’t.
- “Mg deficiency in plants may limit synthesis of chlorophyll, on which photosynthesis depends. Therefore, supplementation of Mg protects plants against toxic effects of fluoride compounds.” I notice a marked improvement in my plants when I feed them magnesium, even though there is fluoride in the water I use to water them.
- “Mg deficiency in animals reduces production of energy, relevant to the Mg-ATP system. Reduction of ATP levels affects in an unfavourable way many metabolic processes connected with the action of ATP (eg, metabolism of carbohydrates, proteins, nucleic acids, lipids, and active transport).” This statement speaks for itself.
- “In summary, it can be stated that in intoxication with fluorine compounds, magnesium plays a protective role by countering and reducing the toxic effects of F.” Someone once asked me why she should spend money to take magnesium when it was just counteracted by fluoride! That’s like saying we shouldn’t bother eating because we just get hungry again. Magnesium will protect us against the toxic effects of fluoride and many other toxins.
Finally, the effects of fluoroquinolone antibiotics are cumulative. Each person has a unique threshold of tolerance that once surpassed creates symptoms corresponding to various disorders, with long-lasting and permanent damage.
What Can I Do?
If I were you, I would do the following to avoid fluoride toxicity:
- Avoid fluoride products (tooth paste, water, etc.) whenever possible.
- Saturate with magnesium. If you are saturated with magnesium if you accidentally ingest fluoride, magnesium will counter and reduce the effects of fluoride.
- If you find yourself in a position where taking medication (especially antibiotics) is necessary, ask your doctor if fluoride is one of the ingredients. If it is, ask for an alternative that does not have fluoride in it.
- If you do take a medication with fluoride in it, make sure that you increase the amount of magnesium you supplement.
About the author:
Dr. Carolyn Dean is a medical doctor and naturopath. She’s the author of over 35 books including best seller The Magnesium Miracle along with IBS for Dummies, Hormone Balance, Death by Modern Medicine, and 110 Kindle books. In 2011, she launched RnA ReSet and brought her 50 years of experience into her proprietary, unique formulations that give every individual at any stage of wellness or illness the necessary building blocks for sustained health, vitality and well-being.
Additionally, Dr. Dean has a free online newsletter to which you can subscribe at RnA ReSet. She also has a weekly internet radio show, Dr. Carolyn Dean Live, on Mondays at 4pm PT/7pm ET.