FOLK MEDICINE IN VERMONT is interested in three R's-Resistance, Repair, and Recovery. First the individual asks himself whether his resistance to disease is as it should be. Next, is he able to repair tissue injury due to accident should it occur? Finally, if sickness should come, is his body able to bring about recovery? Somehow during the passing years he has learned that iodine is related to the ability to resist disease.
Iodine is necessary for the thyroid gland's proper performance of its work. The human thyroid gland is located in the front of the lower part of the neck. All the blood in the body passes through the thyroid gland every 17 minutes. Because the cells making up this gland have an affinity for iodine, during this 17-minute passage the gland's secretion of iodine kills weak germs that may have gained entry into the blood through an injury to the skin, the lining of nose or throat, or through absorption of food from the digestive tract. Strong, virulent germs are rendered weaker during their passage through the thyroid gland. With each 17 minutes that rolls around they are made still weaker until finally they are killed if the gland has its normal supply of iodine. If it does not, it cannot kill harmful germs circulating in the blood as Nature intended it should.
It is well established that the iodine content of the thyroid gland is dependent upon the iodine available in the food and water intake of the individual. If the iodine intake is low the gland is deprived of an element it needs to do its work.
We learn in Vermont folk medicine, however, that this gland performs other functions besides killing harmful germs in the blood. The first is the rebuilding of energy with which to do the day's work. There is a definite relationship be-tween the amount of energy you have and your iodine intake. The first question in the presence of a condition of depleted energy is, Is the soil of the state in which one lives iodine-poor? Second, is the deficiency being made up by supple-mentary means? All soils containing granite are iodine-poor and Vermont is one of them. This fact is very important to people living in Vermont and well may be important to those living elsewhere. When energy and endurance run low in relation to doing the day's work, then the taking of iodine needs to be considered.
A second function of iodine is to calm the body and relieve nervous tension. When nervous tension runs high there is irritability and difficulty in sleeping well at night, and the body is continually on a combat basis, organized for fight and flight. All these points stress a body's need for iodine to lessen nervous tension, relax the body and enable it to or-ganize for peace and quiet, by the building and storing of body reserves against time of need. I have learned through Vermont folk medicine that it is possible to repeatedly change an irritable, impatient, and restless child under ten years of age into a calm, patient individual within two hours' time by giving one drop of Lugol's solution of iodine by mouth in a vegetable or fruit juice or in a glass of water made acid in reaction by adding a teaspoonful of apple cider vinegar. I have repeatedly prescribed this in order to make it possible for a mother of a racehorse-type little boy or girl to be able to live comfortably with the child. I have never seen it fail to calm down a nervous child.
A third function of iodine in the human body relates to clear thinking. The mind simply works better when the body is supplied the iodine it needs.
Then there is the matter of the storing of unwanted fat. Iodine is one of the best oxidizing catalysts we have. A catalyst is the match which touches off in the body the fire that burns up the food we take in each day. If this food is not properly burned off, it may be stored as unwanted fat.
Now while the thyroid gland helpfully stores iodine from the blood passing through it every 17 minutes, the gland may also be made to lose that stored iodine if, for example, we take in drinking water to which chlorine is added, or use too much sodium chloride, whose common name is table salt. There is a well-known law of halogen displacement. The halogen group is made up as follows:
Relative
Halogen Atomic Weight
Fluorine 19.
Chlorine 35.5
Bromine 80.
Iodine 127.
The critical activity of any one of these four halogens is in inverse proportion to its atomic weight. This means that any one of the four can displace the element with a higher atomic weight, but cannot displace an element with a lower atomic weight. For example, fluorine can displace chlorine, bromine and iodine because fluorine has a lower atomic weight than the other three. Similarly, chlorine can displace bromine and iodine because they both have a higher atomic weight. Likewise, bromine can displace iodine from the body because iodine has a higher atomic weight. But a reverse order is not possible. A knowledge of this well-known chemical law brings us to a consideration of the addition of chlorine to our drinking water as a purifying agent. We secure a drinking water that is harmful to the body not because of its harmful germ content but because the chlorine content now causes the body to lose the much-needed iodine.
Because we may live in an iodine-poor area; because drinking water may be treated with chlorine; because we may be sick too often, lack energy and endurance, develop nervous tension, lack the ability of clear thinking, and accumulate unwanted fat, how shall we go about bringing up the iodine content of the body to the point needed?
There are three ways:
1. Eating foods which analysis has shown are particularly rich in iodine. Among these are: all food out of the ocean, radishes, asparagus, carrots, tomatoes, spinach, rhubarb, potatoes, peas, strawberries, mushrooms, lettuce, bananas, cabbage, egg yolk, and onions.
2. Painting a small area of the body with tincture of iodine.
3. Taking preparations known to be rich in iodine. One of these is cod-liver oil. Another is Lugol's solution of iodine. Still another is kelp.
In 1880 a French physician named Lugol originated a solution which contains iodine in a solution of potassium iodide. It has been used steadily ever since it was originated.
When used to maintain the iodine content of the body the dose is small and is taken only on certain days of the week. When the mineral content of the body is analyzed, only a trace of iodine is found. Ten drops of iodine represent more iodine than is found in the entire body. For this reason, the dose of Lugol's solution of iodine is one or two drops, depending on your body weight. If you weigh 150 pounds or less, for example, your dose to maintain the normal iodine content of the body is one drop, taken at one meal on Tuesday and Friday of each week. If you weigh more than 150 pounds, the dose should be two drops instead of one. It is useful to remember that the human body works on the minimum of anything it needs. If there should be a rise in sickness in the area where you live, it would be well to take the Lugol's solution three times a week instead of two, on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, for the purpose of storing up reserve.
How is the drop of the solution to be taken, on the directed days? In general, medical men prescribe iodine to be taken on an empty stomach, preferably 20 minutes before food is taken. During the passing years Vermont folk medicine has worked out a different plan and it is one I like to follow. It has been referred to in another connection elsewhere in this book. To repeat, adding one teaspoonful of apple cider vinegar to a glass of water to make the water acid in reaction, holding the medicine dropper horizontal in order to get a maximum drop, one drop of the Lugol's solution is added to the mixture. The contents are stirred with a spoon and sipped through the course of the meal, as one would drink a cup of coffee or tea.
In relation to supplemental use of iodine, my studies of certain dairy herds has revealed interesting evidences of the relationship between host and microorganisms, viruses, insects, and other parasites .With one herd the veterinary bill had generally run $150.00 and sometimes more a year. At my suggestion, three drops of Lugol's solution of iodine was added to the daily four ounces of apple cider vinegar. Thereafter it was only neccessary to call the veterinary once in a period of eight months, to see a sick cow. In contrast to this, another herd, to which Lugol's solution was not given, had plenty of sick-ness. In an 8-month period it was necessary to spend $50.00 for penicillin in order to save seriously sick cows.
I have observed that lice will leave the hide of a cow that receives apple cider vinegar and iodine; also that flies will not bite the cows when they are on pasture, though flies will and do bite young cattle not receiving the apple cider vinegar and iodine.
In a herd troubled with abortions-evidence of the work of the Bru celia abortus microorganism which grows on an alkaline medium and causes contagious abortion in cattle called Bang's disease, or brucellosis-abortions promptly stopped when each feeding ration received a supplemental three drops of Lugol's solution of iodine to each two ounces of the apple cider vinegar.
While studying selected herds, I became interested in the problem of cattle grubs. These are the larvae, or maggots, of the heel fly. The adult fly does not bite or sting, but it produces great fear and is a serious annoyance to the cattle. Eggs are deposited in a row attached to a single hair of a cow's heel during the first sunny days of spring. The eggs incubate and hatch in three or four days and the newly hatched maggots penetrate the hide of the cow, causing itching and a flow of serum that mats the hair. The young grubs then work their way upward between the muscles and may be found in a few months in the body cavities. They continue to burrow along the surface of the paunch, intestines, and other internal organs. At certain times many of them are found in the wall of the esophagus, leading from the mouth to the stomach. During the fall and winter the grubs will finally come to the top of the back and lie just under the hide. Each grub cuts a hole through the hide to the surface to get the air which it now needs, and to permit it to escape when ripe. The period spent beneath the hide usually runs from 30 to 90 days. These grubs emerge from the hide dur-ing February and March, dropping to the ground to hatch into heel flies. In 18 to 80 days after escaping from the back of the cow, the adult fly hatches and is ready to mate within a half hour.
My object was to rout these cattle grubs by means of the apple cider vinegar and iodine combination; this would demonstrate, to me at least, what the combination would do in the way of making the body as a host unsuitable soil for the development and continuing existence of microorgan isms, viruses, insects, and other parasites.
During one year's time only ten grubs were discovered on the backs of a herd of 45 registered Jersey cows. Usually these grubs are a little larger round than a pencil, but these ten grubs had such hard going in the cows' bodies against the vinegar and iodine that they were no larger around than toothpicks. I observed further with reference to a ration supplement high in iodine value that when it was used, the bacterial count of the milk went down; when iodine was dis-continued, the count went up but could be driven down again immediately with resumption of the iodine.
From Dr. William Weston of South Carolina and his experience with race horses wintered there, I gained interesting and valuable insight into the value of iodine in the body, and its relation to endurance.About 100 race horses are wintered where he lives. Two years previous to a visit I paid him, the man in charge of the horses came to him saying that a horse was under his care which had everything it takes to win the Kentucky Derby. If they could just learn precisely how to feed this horse to maintain its speed capability, he believed the horse would have an outstanding racing season. Would Dr. Weston help him by planning the feeding of the horse?
Dr. Weston was greatly interested and consented to do so As a first step he asked for samples of any and all foods given the horse. The samples were analyzed at the South Carolina Food Research Laboratory. As a result of the analysis, Dr. Weston advised increasing the iodine content of the ration by incorporating into it foods specifically rich in iodine. This was done. In the ensuing season the horse won every race in which it was entered.
As a result of the experience, two wealthy race-horse owners invited Dr. Weston to come to their horse farms to discuss the feeding of their stock. Again iodine-rich foods were added to the usual rations, with the same result; every horse fed on iodine-rich diet won every race in which it was entered. This seems to be a complete demonstration of the relation of iodine to energy and endurance. Subsequently, Dr. Weston sent me a copy of a letter addressed to him as chairman of the South Carolina Food Research Commission. It well illustrates the need of observing the obligation to Nature which must be observed by a daily intake of iodine. The letter ran as follows:
Dear Dr. Weston:
Now that we have reached the halfway mark of this racing season, I should like to tell you some of our observations of the results of wintering our horses in South Carolina, and feeding them your home grown feeds.
After six years of experiment with several hundred horses, we are more convinced than ever that your foods, abundant in iodine and balanced in mineral content, are the saving factor in many of our horses. Allow me to give you an example. This summer an epidemic of influenza and coughing broke out among two year olds at the New York tracks. It spread like wildfire through the stables, and all the old cures and preventives were useless against it. We have checked carefully and find that none of the horses that were wintered in South Carolina, were affected. Naturally we spoke of this often, and by so doing attracted the attention of many people to South Carolina, and the merits of your theories and findings.
We have found that our horses are almost immune to skin diseases, distemper, and other contagious diseases after they have been wintered in South Carolina and brought to the tracks where these ailments are taking their toll. You have observed how quickly we can cure these various ailments in young horses. We believe that the blood is so cleansed by the action of iodine from y
