[..]The Arthritis Cure of Dr Rex Newnham
In the 1960s, Rex Newnham, PhD, DO, ND, then a soil and plant scientist in Perth, Western Australia, developed arthritis. Conventional drugs did not help, but he realised that plants in that area were rather mineral deficient. Knowing that boron aids calcium
metabolism in plants, he started taking 30 mg of borax a day, and in three weeks all pain, swelling and stiffness had disappeared.
Health and medical authorities were not interested in his discovery, but improving arthritis sufferers were delighted. Eventually he had tablets made containing 3 mg of boron, and only by word of mouth he sold 10,000 bottles a month. When he asked a drug company to market the tablets, it indicated that this would replace more expensive drugs and reduce profits. It so happened that it had representatives on government health committees, and arranged that in 1981 Australia instituted a regulation which declared boron and its compounds to be poisons in any concentration. He was fined $1,000 for selling poison, and this successfully stopped his arthritis cure in Australia.2
Subsequently, Dr Newnham published several scientific papers on borax and arthritis. One paper covered a double-blind trial in the mid-1980s at the Royal Melbourne Hospital, which showed considerable improvement in 70 per cent of those who completed the trial; only 12 per cent improved on a placebo.3 He also found that the traditional sugarcane islands have very low soil-boron levels due to long-term heavy use of chemical fertilisers. lamaica has the lowest level, and the arthritis rate is about 70 per cent; he noted that even most dogs were limping. Next comes Mauritius, with very low boron levels and a 50 per cent arthritis rate. The daily boron intake in these countries is less than 1 mg/day. The USA, England, Australia and New Zealand generally have
average soil-boron levels, with an estimated intake of 1-2 mg of boron and an arthritis rate of about 20 per cent. All spas reputedly curing arthritis have very high boron levels. These are also high in Israel, with an estimated daily boron intake of 5-8 mg and an arthritis rate of only 0.5-1.0 per cent.
Bone analysis showed that arthritic joints and nearby bones have only half the boron content of healthy joints, and synovial fluid that lubricates joints is boron deficient in arthritic joints. After boron supplementation, bones were much harder than normal. With additional boron, bone fractures healed in about half the normal time in both humans and animals. Dr Newnham once saw a baby girl, aged nine months, with juvenile arthritis, and borax cured her in two weeks.
Dr Newnham wrote that, commonly, people can get rid of their pain, swelling and stiffness in about one to three months. Then they can reduce treatment from three boron tablets to one tablet (each 3 mg) per day as a maintenance dose. He also stated that patients with rheumatoid arthritis often experienced a Herxheimer! reaction and that this is always a good prognostic sign. They must persevere, and in several more weeks the pain, swelling and stiffness will be gone.4,5
The Herxheimer reaction is an early aggravation of symptoms with increased pain due to toxins released by killed Candida and mycoplasma. I was surprised that this fungicidal effect is already present at such a low dose. It is equally surprising that
also about 30 per cent with osteoarthritis experienced a Herxheimer reaction, suggesting that the border between osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis is rather fluid. In longstanding and resistant cases, use other antimicrobials in addition.[..]
