DNA Damage from Taking Antibiotics is Real

Can you really get DNA damage from taking an antibiotic? The answer is a resounding yes if it happens to be one of a class of antibiotics known as the Fluoroquinolone antibiotics. These include some of the most commonly prescribed antibiotics, such as: Cipro, Ciprofloxacin, Levaquin, Levofloxacin, Avelox, Moxifloxacin and several others that are less well known. If you are new to the damage that these antibiotics can do, please see the Introduction to Fluoroquinolone Antibiotics here. You can also find a List of Fluoroquinolone Antibiotics here so you know which drugs are putting you at risk.

Why is DNA damage such a big deal? Because, despite what you might think, your genetics are not ‘set’ in stone, they are more like ‘possibilities’ that can change depending upon what instructions are given to them from the environment. Fluoroquinolone antibiotics can act as the ‘trigger’ to induce a set of instructions to the DNA that can Trigger Disease Processes such as:

• Autoimmune Disease
• Vision Problems, Including Blindness
• Peripheral Neuropathies
• Aortic Aneurysm– a potentially deadly problem
• and many other serious lifelong health issues

How Does DNA Damage Occur
The Fluoroquinolone class of drugs, despite being called ‘antibiotics’ are actually chemotherapeutic agents that happen to work at killing bacteria. The role of chemotherapeutic agents is to target the DNA of foreign cells in order to kill them. However, just like all the other chemotherapeutic drugs, the Fluoroquinolones don’t just target foreign cells, they also kill the host’s healthy cells as well as causing Mitochondrial Disorder.

Additionally, one of the major sites of DNA Damage occurs in the mitochondria of the cell, damaging the vital energy centers of the body. Mitochondrial Disorders from the Fluoroquinolones is a problem of major importance, and may occur precisely because these agents are designed to attack ‘foreign’ bacterial organisms in the body. This is because the mitochondrial may actually BE foreign single-celled organisms that, over time, became incorporated into the human body to perform certain functions, namely the production of energy from ATP.

In most cases, the foreign bacterial cells are killed off before anyone notices any problems. A healthy person can repair this DNA damage and stop the oxidative stress. However, in some cases, the person taking the drugs already has DNA damage, oxidative stress, inflammation, or nutritional deficiencies from various reasons, they will be at high risk of being overwhelmed by this damage to the cells, and becoming ill or even becoming disabled because of it. Even mainstream medicine is recognizing this serious issue.

DNA Damage Leads to More DNA Damage

One of the major repair mechanisms in the body is cellular division. Think of when you cut yourself and your skin heals. This process involves the current skin cells dividing to make more cells in a process known as cellular mitosis. Cellular mitosis occurs millions of times every day in virtually every part of the body.

“The data obtained in this study suggest that [Ciprofloxacin]-induced DNA damage might be related to oxidative stress and should be considered for further mechanistic studies of central nervous system toxicity of [Ciprofloxacin].”
Ciprofloxacin-induced DNA damage in primary culture of rat astrocytes and protection by Vitamin E

What happens in the case of the Fluoroquinolone antibiotics is that they damage the DNA of healthy cells. These cells then activate mechanisms to fix the damage in the body, but these mechanisms fail due to inflammation, nutritional deficiencies, or existing DNA damage. These damaged cells then end up reproducing, passing on the damaged DNA to the new cells in a vicious cycle. The fact that the Fluoroquinolone Drugs Deplete Iron, and that iron is essential in the reproduction of DNA, doesn’t help this process.

Nutrient Deficiencies

Magnesium deficiency is a known risk factor that increases the likelihood of damage and toxic reactions from Fluoroquinolone antibiotics. This is because virtually every chemical reaction involved in mitosis requires magnesium. Ironically, not only do the Fluoroquinolones damage the cells and the cellular DNA, but they also remove magnesium from the cells, preventing the cells from repairing the damage caused to the DNA, and allowing the damaged DNA to pass from one cell to the next.

Unfortunately, Magnesium Deficiency in the western world is epidemic, even among people who think they are young and healthy. Athletes, in particular, are prone to magnesium deficiency because high levels of exercise use up magnesium and contribute to deficiency, which is why Cipro and Tendonitis and even tendon rupture is a major problem in athletes taking these drugs.

Additionally, the drug’s ability to remove iron was shown to cause ‘epigenetic’ changes in genes, leading the researchers to conclude that this might be one of the mechanism’s for what they called ‘obscure’ side effects of these drugs; like the side effects that many of those reading this have been experiencing ¹. These ‘epigenetic’ changes mean that the drug didn’t actually damage or harm the DNA itself, but it allowed genes for disease to be ‘switched on’ when they were dormant or ‘turned off’ prior to the Fluoroquinolone drugs being taken.

Incidentally, the internet is peppered with reports of athletes taking a Fluoroquinolone drug for a minor problem, where over Half of All Antibiotic Use is Prescribed Inappropriately, such as when there is a:

• Sinus Infection
  
• Traveler’s Diarrhea
• Bladder Infection

and having serious health issues, up to and including complete disability within a short time of taking the drug.

Fluoroquinolone toxicity is not an ‘old and disabled’ person’s problem, this is a problem that can and does affect those seemingly in the prime of their life. Magnesium deficiency is widespread and insidious. Most of those in the western world are affected, but because they don’t recognize that they are magnesium deficient, they do not realize they are putting themselves at high risk for serious problems, including DNA Damage from Fluoroquinolone Antibiotics.

Can You Heal from Fluoroquinolone Toxicity?

If you read the horror stories around the internet of people being damaged by Fluoroquinolone antibiotics, most people will tell you that there is no cure. You either heal or you don’t and there is nothing that you can do about it.

But that is nonsense. People can heal their bodies. Bodies are designed to heal if they are given the proper conditions in which to do so. However, most people have no idea how to go about providing the body the proper conditions to allow it to heal. They might take a random supplement or two at random dosages that have no basis in science or physiology because they simply have not done the extensive research required to cut through the tons of ‘noise’ on the internet that separates the bad information from the good.

Fortunately, someone has done the research for you and the result is the Fluoroquinolone Toxicity Solution. It’s a labor of love built of thousands of hours of research and working with real people who HAVE been healed. The authors have distilled their thousands of hours of research and real-life experiences into a step-by-step protocol that actually works to give you the best chance at allowing your body to heal from Fluoroquinolone Toxicity.

If you are suffering from the ravages of these antibiotics, I urge you to get and follow the protocol contained in The Fluoroquinolone Toxicity Solution. They’ve already done the hard work for you, and you’ll save yourself thousands of hours of research and months or years of trial and error.

We here at FQResearch are the beneficiaries of the information contained in the book. Our staff are victims of Fluoroquinolone poisioning, or their family members and we wholeheartedly endorse the Fluoroquinolone Toxicity Solution. Most of us spent thousands of dollars in an attempt to solve our problems. One of our staff spent over $25,000 and spent hundreds of hours of his time on research before he found the book. Of all the things that he did, following the protocol helped the most of all. The research that we had done led us to only bits and pieces of the solution. We had parts of it, but didn’t get the whole picture and never actually got to the ‘root’ of the problem until we started following the protocol. While none of us are fully healed, all of our biggest improvements came from putting all of the pieces together when we followed the protocol. We are eternally grateful for the information contained in the book and the hope and support it provided us when we felt we’d never heal. We hope that you get as much benefit as we did from the book.

SOURCES
This article was sourced from the many scholarly studies on the Fluoroquinolone antibiotics and their relationship to DNA damage. These studies are outlined at the page on Research on DNA Damage and Fluoroquinolones.