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Lithium is an element, not just a medication. The element is used to medicate people with bipolar, in huge dosages. You and I both consume lithium every day. We

by nibs 10y ago

Lithium is an element, not just a medication. The element is used to medicate people with bipolar, in huge dosages. You and I both consume lithium every day. We may consume slightly more or less than others. The ones who consume slightly more kill themselves significantly less, with no side effects. Lithium the medication is in 100-1000x the dosages, hence the side effects. If it is bad in high (but naturally occurring, and much lower than the medication) doses, we should filter it out.

PragmaticPulp 10y ago
> Lithium is an element, not just a medication. It doesn't matter if you call it an element or a medication, it has non-negligible medical effects and side effects. If it had no relevant effects, we wouldn't be discussing it here. > The ones who consume slightly more kill themselves significantly less, with no side effects. "No side effects" is an impossible claim to make. The studies we do have show a correlation between lithium in the water supply and suicidal frequency in the population. The side effects have not been studied. For some hard evidence: Lithium in drinking water is correlated with changes of thyroid function: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3114818/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3114818/ Lithium most certainly does have side effects that are dose- and time-dependent. The side effects may be minimal at low concentrations, but when applied to a population over the course of a lifetime, they would certainly add up. Especially for those who are most susceptible to the negative effects. It's also not hard to imagine that lithium's suicide rate reduction effects (which are purely correlation at this point, FWIW) are due to it's tendency to mellow people out. The cognitive dulling of even small amounts of lithium orotate in healthy (non-bipolar and non-suicidal) people are palpable. Would you still advocate for lithium in the water if it reduced the average intelligence of the population by, say, 1%? I'm picking hypothetical numbers here, but the reality is that there are certainly downsides to mass-medicating people with small doses of lithium.
- nibs 10y ago
  In that study, the water the people were drinking was up to 20x what was on the high end of the other study. If you are drinking water that is 20-100x higher in lithium, that is more like taking the lithium pills than it is like getting it from water. Further to that, the study proved nothing statistically significant... So if 20x higher lithium concentration causes no statistically significant downsides, what could the harm of being on the upper bound of what is typical in areas that are not lithium mines be?

by nibs 10y ago

PragmaticPulp 10y ago

> Lithium is an element, not just a medication. It doesn't matter if you call it an element or a medication, it has non-negligible medical effects and side effects. If it had no relevant effects, we wouldn't be discussing it here. > The ones who consume slightly more kill themselves significantly less, with no side effects. "No side effects" is an impossible claim to make. The studies we do have show a correlation between lithium in the water supply and suicidal frequency in the population. The side effects have not been studied. For some hard evidence: Lithium in drinking water is correlated with changes of thyroid function: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3114818/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3114818/ Lithium most certainly does have side effects that are dose- and time-dependent. The side effects may be minimal at low concentrations, but when applied to a population over the course of a lifetime, they would certainly add up. Especially for those who are most susceptible to the negative effects. It's also not hard to imagine that lithium's suicide rate reduction effects (which are purely correlation at this point, FWIW) are due to it's tendency to mellow people out. The cognitive dulling of even small amounts of lithium orotate in healthy (non-bipolar and non-suicidal) people are palpable. Would you still advocate for lithium in the water if it reduced the average intelligence of the population by, say, 1%? I'm picking hypothetical numbers here, but the reality is that there are certainly downsides to mass-medicating people with small doses of lithium.

nibs 10y ago
In that study, the water the people were drinking was up to 20x what was on the high end of the other study. If you are drinking water that is 20-100x higher in lithium, that is more like taking the lithium pills than it is like getting it from water. Further to that, the study proved nothing statistically significant... So if 20x higher lithium concentration causes no statistically significant downsides, what could the harm of being on the upper bound of what is typical in areas that are not lithium mines be?