Colloidal Silver as a water disinfecting agent for swimming pools? Colloidal Silver as an alternative to Chlorine?
Egyptians prevented infection after skull surgery by inserting silver plates. Romans reported the use of silver compounds for medical treatment. Silver dollars were used to purify drinking water by early pioneers. Silver has been used to fill cavities and silver nitrate drops were regularly put into newborn’s to prevent blindness due to possible infection during labor. During World War I, soldiers used silver leaf to treat infected wounds. Colloidal silver was used to treat infection and purify water for centuries. In 1973, it was used in an experiment to treat swimming pools.
In the early 1970’s, the Allegheny County Health Department in Pennsylvania conducted tests in a 152,000 gallon pool which previously had been disinfected by a 50 pounds per day chlorinator. The system was replaced by a silver system for the swimming season. The Health Department took up to 50 daily samples during the experiment. The Health Department concluded that colloid silver “is equal to chlorine in maintaining essentially coliform-free pool water, and is somewhat better than chlorine in destroying pseudomonas and staph aureus organism.”
Colloidal silver is used to disinfect water used by the International Space Station, Russia’s Mir Orbital station and NASA. Numerous airlines use colloidal silver to purify drinking water. The Australian and Swiss government have approved colloidal silver purification for the water in homes, offices and towns. The World Health Organization has approved two forms of colloidal silver to disinfect drinking water in developing countries.
It is legal to use colloidal silver in swimming pools, but state and local laws requiring the use of chlorine still apply. This effectively means that if you wish to use colloidal silver legally in your pool, you most likely have to use it to supplement chlorine.
While it has been demonstrated that colloidal silver is effective in treating swimming pool water, there are no established or detailed regimens for adding colloidal silver to swimming pools as there are with chlorine.
Paul Karason, the “Blue Man”, publicly stated that he overused colloidal silver leading to Argyria
When people are considering using silver for their pools, they should take note that overuse of colloidal silver can result in a condition called argyria. Argyria leads to blue or gray discoloration of the skin and there is currently no treatment for it.
We are interested to know if anyone has or has considered using colloidal silver as a water disinfecting agent in their swimming pool? We’d love to hear your thoughts!
Here’s an email reply we received from Mike. He gave us permission to post online:
“Thanks for the article. There is not much on the web re colloidal silver and swimming pools.
I do indeed use a colloidal silver product in my above ground pool (12’x32′ with 54” sides). The product is Sildate and I cannot find it anywhere except from the dealer from whom I purchased the pool; it apparently has a single manufacturer. I hesitate to make any positive health claims about it but we do have crystal clear water and no negative health impact. Also we have none of the brown staining I’ve read about and we are not blue. My approach to the use of any chemical is to use the least possible amount that just gets me into the “safe” zone.
I use an algaecide from the company that makes Sildate as well as an activator for the Sildate. We have a pool filter that uses diatomaceous earth, a great substance you should look into if you haven’t already. We picked DE since we were already familiar with it for various applications including dusting hens’ nesting areas.
So the issue for me is the quackery surrounding colloidal silver. Many far-fetched claims are made for it; and I have indeed been on the FDA website and seen many such claims with the consequent warning letters, etc. When the same site features the benefits of colloidal silver and how to spot UFOs, it becomes difficult to continue supporting a product. I will continue to do my research and to use Sildate until something definitively negative emerges. Then I’m on the whatever the next safest product is – or at least is claimed to be.
Mike”