This one is a bit odd.
So I was watching videos on Bitchute where the truth goes when it is banned by the Google Gestapo. One was a very long interview with a M.D. who has odd ideas. Things like the banned topic of 5G causing virus problems and vaccines being not all that great. The channel is named W0K3 and the video description is:
Dr. Rashid A. Buttar has a virtual sit down with Patrick Bet-David. Ask Dr. Buttar on his site and get all videos
A couple of hours of “fluff” to run in the background while doing other things… but it wasn’t as much fluff as I was expecting. Several bits had me run off and check some outrageous claim. Like the idea that 5G frequencies can change the voltage-gated calcium channels in cells. Turns out it does… Or that Selenium deficiency can cause virus problems while selenium itself is antiviral. Also true. So a Brazil Nut a day is all it takes to have enough, or just settle back with some fish & chips or bacon & eggs. You know, those foods we’re being told to avoid…
https://www.bitchute.com/video/D4sEdWQME7wM/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4288282/
Adv Nutr. 2015 Jan; 6(1): 73–82.
Published online 2015 Jan 7. doi: 10.3945/an.114.007575
PMCID: PMC4288282
PMID: 25593145
Dietary Selenium in Adjuvant Therapy of Viral and Bacterial Infections1Abstract
Viral and bacterial infections are often associated with deficiencies in macronutrients and micronutrients, including the essential trace element selenium. In selenium deficiency, benign strains of Coxsackie and influenza viruses can mutate to highly pathogenic strains. Dietary supplementation to provide adequate or supranutritional selenium supply has been proposed to confer health benefits for patients suffering from some viral diseases, most notably with respect to HIV and influenza A virus (IAV) infections. In addition, selenium-containing multimicronutrient supplements improved several clinical and lifestyle variables in patients coinfected with HIV and Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Selenium status may affect the function of cells of both adaptive and innate immunity. Supranutritional selenium promotes proliferation and favors differentiation of naive CD4-positive T lymphocytes toward T helper 1 cells, thus supporting the acute cellular immune response, whereas excessive activation of the immune system and ensuing host tissue damage are counteracted through directing macrophages toward the M2 phenotype. This review provides an up-to-date overview on selenium in infectious diseases caused by viruses (e.g., HIV, IAV, hepatitis C virus, poliovirus, West Nile virus) and bacteria (e.g., M. tuberculosis, Helicobacter pylori). Data from epidemiologic studies and intervention trials, with selenium alone or in combination with other micronutrients, and animal experiments are discussed against the background of dietary selenium requirements to alter immune functions.Keywords: micronutrient, supplementation, selenoprotein, AIDS, immunity
Odd that we’ve not heard anything about checking selenium status of patients with sever disease. Though I’d bet not many Elder Care homes feed a lot of bacon & egg breakfasts or have bowls of Brazil Nuts setting about.
This next one I find very odd. Low selenium causes a point mutation in a virus that enhances the disease during viral replication.
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/302264562_Selenium_as_an_antiviral_agent
from book Selenium: Its Molecular Biology and Role in Human Health (pp.235-245)
Selenium as an antiviral agent
Chapter · January 2001 with 1,336 Reads
DOI: 10.1007/978-1-4615-1609-5_19Abstract
Recent work with selenium has demonstrated that a deficiency in this trace mineral will lead to increased viral pathogenesis. Selenium-deficient animals infected with a viral pathogen demonstrate immune dysfunction, including altered chemokine and cytokine expression patterns. A benign coxsackievirus infection of selenium-deficient mice leads to the development of myocarditis and further experiments demonstrated that the change in virulence was due to point mutations in the viral genome. Thus, replication in a selenium-deficient host led to a normally benign virus acquiring virulence due to viral mutations. A deficiency in selenium is also associated with disease progression in HIV-infected individuals and with hepatitis C virus-induced liver cancers. It appears that adequate levels of selenium help to protect the host against viral infection.
As fish are a large source, and folks in Sweden eat a lot of fish, that might also matter to their success. Would be interesting to see comparative diet information on folks with low symptoms vs bad symptoms.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3780531/
J Cell Mol Med. 2013 Aug; 17(8): 958–965.
Published online 2013 Jun 26. doi: 10.1111/jcmm.12088
PMCID: PMC3780531
PMID: 23802593
Electromagnetic fields act via activation of voltage-gated calcium channels to produce beneficial or adverse effectsAbstract
The direct targets of extremely low and microwave frequency range electromagnetic fields (EMFs) in producing non-thermal effects have not been clearly established. However, studies in the literature, reviewed here, provide substantial support for such direct targets. Twenty-three studies have shown that voltage-gated calcium channels (VGCCs) produce these and other EMF effects, such that the L-type or other VGCC blockers block or greatly lower diverse EMF effects. Furthermore, the voltage-gated properties of these channels may provide biophysically plausible mechanisms for EMF biological effects. Downstream responses of such EMF exposures may be mediated through Ca2+/calmodulin stimulation of nitric oxide synthesis. Potentially, physiological/therapeutic responses may be largely as a result of nitric oxide-cGMP-protein kinase G pathway stimulation. A well-studied example of such an apparent therapeutic response, EMF stimulation of bone growth, appears to work along this pathway. However, pathophysiological responses to EMFs may be as a result of nitric oxide-peroxynitrite-oxidative stress pathway of action. A single such well-documented example, EMF induction of DNA single-strand breaks in cells, as measured by alkaline comet assays, is reviewed here. Such single-strand breaks are known to be produced through the action of this pathway. Data on the mechanism of EMF induction of such breaks are limited; what data are available support this proposed mechanism. Other Ca2+-mediated regulatory changes, independent of nitric oxide, may also have roles. This article reviews, then, a substantially supported set of targets, VGCCs, whose stimulation produces non-thermal EMF responses by humans/higher animals with downstream effects involving Ca2+/calmodulin-dependent nitric oxide increases, which may explain therapeutic and pathophysiological effects.Keywords: intracellular Ca2+, voltage-gated calcium channels, low frequency electromagnetic field exposure, nitric oxide, oxidative stress, calcium channel blockers
Not sure I like the idea of pathophysiological and adverse effects, even if some times it can do something else that’s good. Randomly and continuously screwing around with your cell membranes and metabolism is generally not a good idea. Adding more “oxidative stress” to people who are already having problems caused by too much is also not helpful, so anyone checking the microwave level around “hot spots” of disease or where patients are being treated? How’s that “WiFi in the hospital” double blind test going?…
https://www.healthline.com/health/selenium-foods
Brazil nuts
Fish
Ham
Enriched foods
Pork
Beef
Turkey
Chicken
Cottage cheese
Eggs
Brown rice
Sunflower seeds
Baked beans
Mushrooms
Oatmeal
Spinach
Milk and yogurt
Lentils
Cashews
Bananas
So I’m still thinking some of what the guy is saying seems a bit “out there”. OTOH, every bit I checked has had a factual basis behind it (but I didn’t check everything, or even most).
Do realize that too much selenium makes you very sick, so don’t OD on Brazil Nuts.
Age Recommended daily amount of selenium Over 14 years 55 mcg 9 to 13 years 40 mcg 4 to 8 years 30 mcg 7 months to 3 years 20 mcg Birth to 6 months 15 mcg
1. Brazil nuts
Brazil nuts are one of the best sources of selenium. One ounce, or about six to eight nuts, contains about 544 mcg. Make sure you only eat a serving of Brazil nuts a few times a week to avoid selenium toxicity.2. Fish
Yellowfin tuna contains about 92 mcg of selenium per 3 ounces (oz), making it an excellent source of selenium. This is followed by sardines, oysters, clams, halibut, shrimp, salmon, and crab, which contain amounts between 40 and 65 mcg.3. Ham
Many health-conscious eaters avoid ham due to its high salt content. However, it provides about 42 mcg of selenium per 3 oz serving, or 60 percent of the recommended daily intake for adults.
Musings from the Chiefio 
I read some source discussing WuFlu mortality, and they said all the dead had below normal selenium. Small number of patients, under 100. Probably about 60 days ago, as my selenium supplement bottle is about empty.
@Another Jim:
My bottle of house brand “Mens” multivitamin from Walmart lists 117 mcg selenium and claims it is 107% of recommended daily. So I don’t need a specific pill.
You prompted me to do a different search:
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=covid-19+selenium+deficiency+patients&t=brave&ia=news&iai=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.sci-news.com%2Fmedicine%2Flink-dietary-selenium-covid-19-cure-rate-08379.html&pn=1
http://www.sci-news.com/medicine/link-dietary-selenium-covid-19-cure-rate-08379.html
https://www.cihs.edu/single-post/2020/03/20/COVID-19-Prevention-and-Treatment
That’s interesting. Many years ago (1970s) I bought for a few pence at a University library clearout a small pamphlet entitled “Selenium Deficiency in Sheep”. (This was more as an eccentric curio than as part of any specific investigation ;-) The one-sentence abstract I’ve remembered ever since is that selenium-deficient sheep are generally sicklier than healthy ones, which would seem to chime with everything here. Given that the item was surplus to requirements in the mid-70s, there must be a lot of unobtrusive knowledge of the health effects (including veterinary, as in my paper) of most elements by now – let’s face it, selenium isn’t the first thing most people think of if they’re a bit under the weather, but it’s been researched for over 40 years.
As a result of reading my eccentric curio, I’ve tended ever since to treat myself to the odd course of selenium tablets whenever I see them: the ones in the kitchen currently are 100 micrograms of Se with small portions of vitamins A, C and E (labelled “Selenium A+C+E”) – presumably the vitamins are a calculated mix to grease the skids of the selenium on its journey to inside the cells. Certainly, as I’ve commented elsewhere, I’m still blissfully unaware of Covid despite my intrinsic sensitivity to respiratory ailments, so perhaps my “vague superstition” about selenium, acquired by chance nearly half a century ago, is indeed helping.
As a former Livestock farmer it was necessary to study nutrition, right down to the micro metals. Selenium is a strange one in that an excess gave many of the same symptoms as a shortage did. If your food came from areas like the San Joaquin Valley with it’s high alkaline soils there was not likely a shortage, but if your food was grown in Acid soils there might be a shortage. There a number of metals that are required in balance for proper cell function Copper and Zinc must be in balance for instance.
@pg – So how does one get everything in balance?
My mom’s advice was about the best I’ve heard. “Eat a little bit of everything and not too much of any one thing.”
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How reliable are those RDAs (Recommended Daily Amount) printed on everything you buy to eat? They are brought to us by the same people that designed the food pyramid with carbs as the base and recommended hydrogenated vegetable oils instead of butter.
What have they ever done to deserve our trust in any of their numbers and recommendations?
Brazil nuts are usually sold in a mixture of bulk mixed nuts. At a young age we tried to get them out of the shell without breaking or any chipping. Regardless of doing that successfully, we would eat the whole thing. I think we often ate 2 or 3 at a time – then switched to trying the other nuts in the mixture. Half a century later I learn that ½ a Brazil nut might be good for me, but 3 at a time ought to carry a ‘ Yuk! ‘ sticker.
Maybe at Christmas we would have ham with other things on the list, such as Deviled Eggs, rice, and bread.
The savior: Most sites use the phrase “chronically high intakes” lead to symptoms.
As kids, I don’t imagine we knew what chronically meant.
@Nancy & John:
Looks like the spread from beneficial to problematic is large:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3225252/
So, yeah, 200x and for a while….
@H.R.:
As we know the reccomended vit-D is at the “just don’t get rickets” level and 1/2 to 1/3 the optimal performance level; and as we know Vit-C reccomended is fixed while body demand varies with stresses and illness (and way low during infections): I think that’s an existence proof that the recommendations are poor.
Oh, and it would be very interesting to find out if other vitamins and minerals have demand modulate with illness. Does a heavy viral load consume zinc & selenium until you are deficient, then exploit that weakness? It would be a good virus strategy…
Metals needed to make immune proteins ought to be consumed more when more are made. How efficient is the internal recycle process?
A caution on Selenium. When you purchase it in bulk for pharmaceutical use, it comes labelled with a skull and crossbones. It is possible to overdose on selenium. Don’t overdose with selenium.
Otherwise, it’s popular in many livestock feed additives (and human vitamins) for use where the normal grass / feed doesn’t contain sufficient trace selenium. So, just like with animals, we all need some, just not too much.
Of course they do, EM. Just like they up the amounts for women who are pregnant and/or breast feeding that voracious ‘clump of cells’ called a child. How many and how well these have been studied is a different question.
Same with dietary intake. Most studies that I know of were simple self-reported answers to a questionnaire. No measurements taken, not only of the amounts of food eaten, but of the actual constituents of the foods said to have been eaten. (Recall, there is a wide variation among all biologicals; often more within groups than between them.) Part of the reason why, in the US, so few vitamin level tests are done is simply the combination of the cost and that given how much Americans eat, it is simply thought that deficiencies are rare. I think that’s changing, a bit. When I had my run-in with kidney stones a decade ago, they checked mine. Often, the neurologist will check them, too; since many deficiencies will show up as neurological problems.
H.R.: “What have they ever done to deserve our trust in any of their numbers and recommendations?”
That was pretty much rhetorical.
The recommendations come from a bureaucracy, for cryin’ out loud. Their concern is to not buck the consensus, keep your head down until retirement, unless you’re ambitious, then backstabbing and sabotage of the person(s) ahead of you are in order. Oh, and in all cases make sure your ass is covered so nothing definitive can be pinned on you.
Thanks to the internet, we can now get refined information that’s more useful. E.M.’s blog, for instance, kicks around some nutritional topics and readers here have a much better idea of how much C, D3, Zn, quinine, and a few others under very recent discussion. We get the minimums and caveats about maximums.
From the medical side, it’s not the doctors of the bureaucracy that are cutting edge, it’s the independent doctors who have noticed something in their patients worth following up. And that’s where you get videos of two different doctors saying X is great, a third doctor saying X is garbage, and yet another doctor who finds that X is great up to the point where that third doctor correctly identified that X is garbage because it was too much, but didn’t realize it was too much.
And so on.
We can see from the absolute fupped-duck fiasco of a response to the current novel virus by WHO, the CDC, the FDA, throw in the AMA, and their counterparts in other countries that top down bureaucratic control is much worse than letting doctors figure out a path forward.
The practicing doctors can independently try many different things based on experience or a flash of insight and as we’ve seen in the current situation, treatment and preventative solutions came about pretty quickly. None of this stuff was coming from the Government Health TLAs. They were actually fighting good solutions for various reasons, either political or from just plain ol’ bureaucratic inertia.
The one thing the TLAs should be good for is identifying that there’s a problem because cases are supposed to be reported to them as the central aggregator and watchdog for outbreaks of various sorts. And they failed at that job in the case of this virus. “Nothing to see here. Move along.” OOPS!
I’m preaching to the choir here. We know to go looking for information ourselves and bring it here to work things out. I am wondering how many more people will wake up to the fact that rarely is government the solution to problems. They are most likely to be the problem.
Stevec
Bearing in mind your admittedly eccentric pamphlet purchase, if you were a public figure being interviewed on Zoom, with your library shelves on display behind you, what other decidedly off the wall reading matter would you have on display?
Tonyb
Head and Shoulders Clinical Strength shampoo contains 1% selenium sulfide. One wash a week ought to do it.
The OTC Head & Shoulders in California is pyrithone zinc 1%
Don’t know if that’s just a California paranoia about TOXIC!!! selenium or OTCness…
But if you could mix the two together, your hair would be perfectly protected against viral infections!
(That’s a :-) for folks unaware hair is not alive and you don’t drink shampoo…)
In the book “The Invisible Rainbow”, there is a page with a 2-column list:
Table 1 – Effects of Electricity as Reported in the Eighteenth Century
Column 1 – Therapeutic and neutral effects
Change in pulse rate
Sensations of taste, light, and sound
Increase of body temperature
Pain relief
Restoration of muscle tone
Stimulation of appetite
Mental exhilaration
Sedation
Perspiration
Salivation
Secretion of ear wax
Secretion of mucus
Menstruation, uterine contraction
Lactation
Lacrimation
Urination
Defecation
Column 2 – Non-therapeutic effects
Dizziness
Nausea
Headaches
Nervousness
Irritability
Mental confusion
Depression
Insomnia
Drowsiness
Fatigue
Weakness
Numbness and tingling
Muscle and joint pains
Muscle spasms and cramps
Backache
Heart palpitations
Chest pain
Colic
Diarrhea
Constipation
Nosebleeds, hemorrhage
Itching
Tremors
Seizures
Paralysis
Fever
Respiration infections
Shortness of breath
Coughing
Wheezing and asthma attacks
Eye pain, weakness and fatigue
Ringing in the ears
Metallic taste
So there is more food for thought! Exposure to electricity can cause things to happen that are considered to be beneficial, or harmful.
My Father said that when electricity was first introduced on the farm, he and some other family members could hear it as a kind of buzzing hum. You could argue it was some part doing a magnetic induced physical vibration. OTOH, he trained my magnetic sense so I could just close my eyes and by moving my head side to side, feel north. Hasn’t failed me yet.
And, when about 8, we rewired the house from a few surface mount wires and bare lightbulbs to romex and a proper entry box. (House built about 1900). While doing yhat he asked if I could hear the electricity. Then, in a dead quiet house, I could tell when it was on vs off. Not really a sound in the ears. More like a buzz felt in the skull. Sensing North is like feeling a static pressure.
My best guess is both are the magnetic sense, but unless trained early, you can’t interpret it right.
FWIW, after years immersed in huge EMF Smog, I don’t sense electricity much at all. A prickle from high volts about it. But I can still find north. Quiet helps.
Love Brazil nuts at times until you get a bad one. Doubt you could get a problem with large amounts re Selenium as have never seen any warnings about their consumption.
angech: “Doubt you could get a problem with large amounts re Selenium as have never seen any warnings about their consumption.”
That’s because no one can crack one of those suckers open. Most sane people give up after one.
Even Wile E. Coyote would have better luck with the roadrunner than a Brazil nut.
;o)
@Tonyb – Hah! That’s a good question, though rather than disrupt the Selenium and Other Minor Players thread, I’ll think about it and give you a few samples under W.O.O.D. a little later in the day, so it can ramify. (E.M.’s GMT timestamps are my time, so I’ve just had my breakfast and am getting ready now to go queue and do today’s Essential Shopping.)
The biggest problem with display is that the oddities are mostly pretty unimpressive to look at: the Selenium in Sheep paper is only a few sheets of paper folded in half and stapled. I only have the Codex Serafiniani in electronic format, though it’s outstandingly and delightfully odd. Some physical books, like Raymond Briggs’ delicious “Fungus the Bogeyman” were treasures until lent and lost. But I’ll see what catches my eye today and put a few on W.O.O.D. later: warning, as a philosophy graduate with catholic interests, I have quite a few books to scan … ;-)
Another in the little bits category is arsenic, which is bordering on being considered an essential trace mineral. With the “too much” problem being well known. We. being in a deficient area, are duty bound to get into the prawns when we go coastal.
A character from the Northern Territory was known to do “trace testings” with strychnine. He did it on the airstrip, on the basis that, if you overdid it a bit and broke into a gallop “you wouldn’t want to run into a tree”.
Vit D is finally in the news … but don’t rush out and buy it, we want to study it for at least a year before you do …
The researchers also found a strong correlation between vitamin D levels and cytokine storm, which is a hyperinflammatory condition caused by an overactive immune system.
“Cytokine storm can severely damage lungs and lead to acute respiratory distress syndrome and death in patients,” Ali Daneshkhah, a postdoctoral research associate at Northwestern’s McCormick School of Engineering, said in a statement. “This is what seems to kill a majority of COVID-19 patients, not the destruction of the lungs by the virus itself. It is the complications from the misdirected fire from the immune system.”
However, the scientists also cautioned against hoarding vitamin D supplements.
“While I think it is important for people to know that vitamin D deficiency might play a role in mortality, we don’t need to push vitamin D on everybody,” said Northwestern’s Vadim Backman, who led the research, in a statement. “This needs further study, and I hope our work will stimulate interest in this area. The data also may illuminate the mechanism of mortality, which, if proven, could lead to new therapeutic targets.”
https://www.foxnews.com/science/vitamin-d-levels-covid-19-mortality-rates
EMS – unless you’ve built yourself a natural radio, easy to do, you haven’t a clue all the emf noise around you! I was surprised. I even discovered our electricity provider used low frequency codes to automate their system. It was a mystery for a while.
A classic design:
http://auroralchorus.com/bbb4rx3.htm
Lot’s more at:
http://auroralchorus.com/
@Jim2:
Oh, I know. I’ve built dozens of radios over the years from my first crystal set, to regenerative tube, to several stage superhet. There are currently 4 “shortwave” radios inside the house with frequency coverage from below AM to TV band coverage (back before digital TV).
I think that is part of why folks are now deaf to the effect. I only experienced it out in the country prior to the transistor age.
To get clue about the electronic smog now, set an AM radio in front of your computer….
Now, with satellites beaming down globally, even out in the “wilderness” is no longer remote or quiet.
EM – the natural radio makes low frequency EMF audible. It’s really interesting and you live in a place where you could get away from power lines and hear ionospheric phenomena – like whistlers or the dawn chorus, and others.
https://archive.org/details/Auroral_Chorus_2_The_Original_Tracks
And lightning! IMHO it is the crashing cymbals of natures EMF Symphony… On AM you can pick up storms miles away. IIRC, there is also a global resonance about 9 Hz.
@ EM re AM radio and storms…
When I was growing up, more than once we took a road trip to see some relatives in New Mexico. More than once, as we approached Tucumcari, our AM car radio would start playing the big Oklahoma City station (WKY?). We had lost it hours before because we were too far away.
More than once we were near or going through a thunderstorm when all this happened.
Professor Smyth,
I double checked your dietary list above and you seem to have missed Red Wine.
In these times of mass hysteria I find it an essential part of a balanced diet.
Btw if has not been mentioned above, that great killer, white flour, used to be/ still is fortified by selenium – in Britain anyway.
On the subject of lack of Vitamin D, here in the uk rickets is a big problem among our most resent “guest population”
The ones who are covered head to toe to protect their modesty – I don’t necessarily mean the Sisters of Mercy.
Patrick Healy says: “The ones who are covered head to toe to protect their modesty”
That should read “The ones who are covered head in an attempt to avoid rape.”
Great article! I watch Dr Buttar and he is a smart guy. He does not get much love from the mainstream media.