We discovered the contaminated probiotic supplement during routine ICP-MS testing at our in-house laboratory, the Consumer Wellness lab, which is ISO 17025 accredited as a food and heavy metals laboratory.
The probiotic supplement, which is touted as a "soil-based microorganisms" probiotic supplement, uses a mined mineral matrix as its primary ingredient. That ingredient is called "Leonardite" and is often found near coal mining or coal processing operations. This Leonardite matrix contains toxic heavy metals, including lead. It's also high in humic acid, which is why it's used as a soil amendment. For the purposes of this exclusive article, we are not claiming that Leonardite, when sold as a soil amendment, is dangerous. Our focus here is the fact that it's being added to dietary supplements that are consumed orally. In that context, we believe Leonardite represents a health hazard to humans.
For some reason, the manufacturer of a probiotics supplement decided to use Leonardite as the No. 1 ingredient in their product, giving it a very dark, black-like color. Because of the use of Leonardite, the product as a whole raises huge red flags with the amount of lead and aluminum it contains.
Notably, Amazon.com does not test the third-party products it sells, which is why Amazon is gladly selling this product to the public, apparently oblivious to the extremely high levels of lead and aluminum it contains. (Read more news about heavy metals at HeavyMetals.news.)
The levels found in this probiotic supplement are:
Lead: Over 5,000 ppb
Aluminum: Nearly 3,000,000 ppb
Lead is a toxic heavy metals linked to brain damage, and aluminum is a toxic metal linked to Alzheimer's, kidney disorders and a variety of neurological problems. The fact that this probiotic supplement is openly sold to the public through Jeff Bezos' Amazon.com retail operation demonstrates Amazon's utter lack of quality control and public safety measures.
Don't expect the Washington Post to cover this news, of course, since Jeff Bezos owns that news organization as well. You'll only learn this from the independent media. And even across the realm of independent media, we are the only organization that owns and operates an independent laboratory that's ISO accredited in mass spec analysis. (I wrote an entire book on heavy metals in food. It's called Food Forensics, and ironically, it became the No. 1 best-selling science book on Amazon.com for a period of time.)
See the full video on this probiotic supplement exclusively at Brighteon.com:
https://www.brighteon.com/89b9571b-7fd2-4171-92c7-bb1e85ae9fb1
Leonardite contains 10,000 ppb of lead and over 3,500,000 ppb aluminum
Curious about the toxic elements found in Leonardite itself, we purchased a bag of Leonardite from Amazon.com and tested it via ICP-MS. The results were even more alarming than what we had found with the probiotic supplement:
Lead = 10,000 ppb
Aluminum = 3,500,000 ppb
These are insanely high levels of toxic elements for something that people are taking as a dietary supplement. Importantly, when Leonardite is sold by itself, it's only labeled as a garden or soil amendment. It's not labeled for internal consumption. But when probiotics companies add Leonardite to their oral products, they are taking a highly contaminated substance that's full of lead and aluminum, then adding it to their probiotics supplements that people swallow.
In conducting research for this article, we left messages with Leonardite Products, LLC, located in Williston, ND, asking for a statement on whether they are aware their product is being used as the primary ingredient in a dietary supplement. We did not receive a response at the time this article was published, but we may update the article if we hear back from this company. From their website, there is no indication that Leonardite Products intends for their raw material to be sold as a dietary supplement.
Their product safety web page urges caution:
Leonardite Products are environmentally stable and will not cause harmful effects to soil or groundwater. However, as is the case with any organic or chemical compound, some safety precautions should be taken while handling and applying our products. Please take the time to read the caution labels and use Leonardite Products in compliance with the instructions listed on product labels and throughout this web site.
On the Leonardite Products website, the company links to a "heavy mineral analysis" PDF which shows testing results from lab tests conducted by Midwest Laboratories, Inc. in December, 2013:
Aluminum: 5,658,000 ppb, or 7,678,000 ppb after the material is dried
Lead: 5,900 ppb, or 8,100 ppb after the material is dried
UNITS explanation: The units in their PDF are mg/kg. This is the same as parts per million or ppm. Multiple mg/kg by 1,000 to arrive at parts per billion. In other words, all the following descriptions are equivalent:
1 mg / kg = 1 ppm = 1,000 ppb = 1,000 ug / kg, etc. This are all standard metric units, mass / mass, used in food science.
These reported levels of lead and aluminum from Midwest Laboratories are in agreement with our own testing, when taking into account the natural variability of the product itself. This means at least two labs have now confirmed very high levels of lead and aluminum in this product. Again, if used as labeled -- as a soil amendment -- this is not an immediate health hazard for humans. But when used as a dietary supplement, it presents very serious hazards to customers. (To be clear, the Leonardite company does not label their bulk product for human consumption.)
The fact that Leonardite Products publicly posted their mineral analysis means the probiotic manufacturer that used this material in a dietary supplement should have been aware of the high levels of lead and aluminum it contained. They cannot claim ignorance. (We are not naming the probiotic supplement company here, but they are easily identified by looking for "Leonardite" as the first ingredient in their supplement.)
The Leonardite Products company warns against internal consumption
The Safety Data Sheet posted by Leonardite Products warns about internal consumption of their product:
Section 4: First Aid Measures
Ingestion: If conscious, drink large quantities of water. Do not induce vomiting. Take immediately to a hospital or physician. If vomiting occurs, administer additional water. If unconscious or in convulsions, take immediately to a hospital. Do not attempt to induce vomiting or give anything by mouth to an unconscious person.
It appears, then, that Leonardite Products is very likely not aware that their raw material is being added to dietary supplements which are marketing and sold by Amazon.com, intended to be orally consumed by unaware customers.
It also makes us wonder how a dietary supplement company can apparently source absolutely anything they want -- including bulk materials that are never intended for human consumption -- and make it the primary ingredient for a dietary supplement sold on Amazon.com. Are there no safety standards whatsoever when it comes to marketing dietary supplements and profiting from their sale? Does Amazon.com have zero quality control or public safety standards?
By the way, this is the exact same situation as zeolites, another mined mineral matrix that's extremely contaminated with lead and aluminum. Yet zeolites are ground into a powder and sold as a dietary supplement on Amazon.com as well. They've been sold there for years. Nobody has done anything about this except us. We exposed the high lead in zeolites in 2015. In response, we were of course attacked by the zeolite supplement marketers.
Watch my full lab video at Brighteon.com to learn more:
https://www.brighteon.com/89b9571b-7fd2-4171-92c7-bb1e85ae9fb1
Amazon.com should be sued for selling a dietary supplement with such high levels of lead and aluminum
All of this brings up an important question: Why is Amazon.com selling a probiotics supplement made with a non-food-grade mineral matrix substance that contains hazardous levels of lead and aluminum if consumed orally?
Why doesn't Amazon test the products it sells? To my knowledge, the Health Ranger Store is the only natural products retailer in the world that routinely tests every production lot for heavy metals, glyphosate and microbiology. We would never sell a product that contains 5,000 ppb of lead.
Why isn't the FDA raiding Amazon warehouses across America to confiscate this product and protect the public? In years past, we've seen the FDA conduct armed raids on natural product companies that contained healing substances such as medicinal herbs and natural phytonutrients. But the FDA appears to take no action whatsoever when there's a dietary supplement being sold that contains hazardous levels of toxic elements like lead. Why isn't the FDA taking action on this? (And more importantly, why does it take an independent laboratory to tell you about this, when the FDA has the responsibility to do all this testing in the first place?)
Where are there no media reports whatsoever on all this? The same media that freaks out and goes berserk over 65 ppb of arsenic in wine has nothing at all to say about 5,000+ ppb of lead in a dietary supplement? Astonishing...
The bottom line: Don't trust anything sold by Amazon.com... it may be full of lead or other toxic metals
The upshot of all this is simple: Don't trust anything sold by Amazon.com. Their dietary supplements may be heavily contaminated with lead, arsenic, cadmium, mercury, aluminum or theoretically even radioactive isotopes. Amazon has no idea what they're selling because they don't test third party products. Apparently, any manufacturer can claim to have a "dietary supplement" and get it sold on Amazon.com, which means Amazon is essentially endorsing these products and serving as a conduit to put toxic products into the hands of consumers. This is beyond unethical; it's negligence.
CWC Labs is available to provide ISO-accredited ICP-MS testing results to any law firm that wishes to initiate a class action lawsuit against Amazon.com. Contact us for details. Furthermore, any competent lab in America can confirm these results. You can find this product to purchase on Amazon by going to Amazon.com and searching for "soil based probiotics leonardite."
By the way, the same supplement manufacturer also sells a similar product for pets. Yes, it also contains Leonardite as the No. 1 ingredient. So Fido can literally eat lead.
The cost of telling the truth in a culture of deception and greed
Both myself and Natural News are routinely censored, slandered, defamed, demonetized and demonized by the "science establishment" in order to silence my whistleblowing lab science work. Now you know why: We are the only independent media organization in the world that's testing off-the-shelf products and blowing the whistle on powerful corporations that are poisoning the people. The efforts to discredit our work have been unprecedented in the history of journalism.
No one else is doing this work. Not even the FDA. And certainly not the Washington Post. If you want the truth about food science, see more of my videos at FoodForensics.com.
Read NaturalNews.com daily to get the latest truth on food, environment, civil liberties, culture and more.
Watch my full lab video at Brighteon.com to learn more. You will be astonished at the truth you're not being told by the manufacturers, marketers and regulators of dietary supplements:
https://www.brighteon.com/89b9571b-7fd2-4171-92c7-bb1e85ae9fb1
P.S. Want to know how much lead, aluminum, cadmium and mercury is your favorite supplements? We can test your supplements using ICP-MS. We're also able to test your hair, well water, tap water or superfoods. Acquire this heavy metals testing kit from the Health Ranger Store to send us your sample.
Mike Adams (aka the "Health Ranger") is the founding editor of NaturalNews.com, a best selling author (#1 best selling science book on Amazon.com called "Food Forensics"), an environmental scientist, a patent holder for a cesium radioactive isotope elimination invention, a multiple award winner for outstanding journalism, a science news publisher and influential commentator on topics ranging from science and medicine to culture and politics.
Mike Adams also serves as the lab science director of an internationally accredited (ISO 17025) analytical laboratory known as CWC Labs. There, he was awarded a Certificate of Excellence for achieving extremely high accuracy in the analysis of toxic elements in unknown water samples using ICP-MS instrumentation.
In his laboratory research, Adams has made numerous food safety breakthroughs such as revealing rice protein products imported from Asia to be contaminated with toxic heavy metals like lead, cadmium and tungsten. Adams was the first food science researcher to document high levels of tungsten in superfoods. He also discovered over 11 ppm lead in imported mangosteen powder, and led an industry-wide voluntary agreement to limit heavy metals in rice protein products.
Adams has also helped defend the rights of home gardeners and protect the medical freedom rights of parents. Adams is widely recognized to have made a remarkable global impact on issues like GMOs, vaccines, nutrition therapies, human consciousness.
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