Before Baby Goes Home->Vitamin K

Vitamin K and Hepatitis B are mandated in most states to be given to newborns before they go home with mom.   This has been proven to be a dangerous procedure at best.   Potentially lethal.

Vitamin K

The marketed purpose of the Vitamin K injection is that newborns have very little to begin with.  Vitamin K is essential for the ability of blood clotting should any injury occur.   Another marketed purpose is the prevention of hemorrhagic diseases of the newborn (HDN).  HDN is a bleeding disorder associated with low levels of vitamin K in newborn babies. It was first defined in 1894 by Townsend as spontaneous external or internal bleeding occurring in newborn infants.  Diagnosis was based solely on the opinion of the attendant medical personnel because there was no criteria in determining the cause of hemorrhaging.  Townsend did not label hemophilia as a cause of HDN.  The vaccine is also marketed to be essential prior to surgery.  Thus, supposedly prevents excessive bleeding. 

Vitamin K is naturally stored and metabolized by the liver.  The cell division that rapidly continues after birth depends on precise amounts of vitamin K to proceed at the proper rate. Introduction of levels that are 20,000 times the newborn level, the amount usually injected, can have devastating consequences.

Nursing naturally raises the infant's vitamin K levels very gradually after birth so that no disregulation occurs that would encourage leukemia development.  This is the way the Creator designed it to be.   The clotting system of the healthy newborn is well planned, and healthy breastfed infants do not suffer bleeding complications, even without any supplementation.  While nursing infants demonstrate lower blood levels of vitamin K than the "recommended" amount, they show no signs of vitamin K deficiency.  This can only lead to the question of how and where the “recommended” amount was brought about.

Vitamin K vaccinations are also marketed for newborns to prevent vitamin K deficiency bleeding (such as hemophilia) that may occur in approximately 1 in 10,000 live births.  Hemophilia is the oldest known hereditary bleeding disorder of which there are two types: A and B (Christmas Disease). Low levels or the absence of a blood protein, essential for clotting, causes both. Patients with hemophilia A lack the blood clotting protein, factor VIII, and those with hemophilia B lack factor IX. There are about 20,000 hemophilia patients in the United States. Each year, about 400 babies are born with this disorder. Approximately 85% have hemophilia A and the remainder has hemophilia B. 

The severity of hemophilia is related to the amount of the clotting factor in the blood. About 70% of hemophilia patients have less than one percent of the normal amount which leads to severe hemophilia.  A small increase in the blood level of the clotting factor, up to five percent of normal, results in mild hemophilia with rare bleeding except after injuries or surgery. The most important challenges facing the hemophilia patient, health care provider, and research community today are safety of products used for treatment, management of the disease including inhibitor formation, irreversible joint damage, and life-threatening hemorrhage.  Bleeding into the brain occurs mainly from three to seven weeks after birth in just over five out of 100,000 births.  Forty percent of these infants suffer permanent brain damage or death.

The vitamin K inoculations administered by hospitals and manufactured by Merck and Roche and Abbott are synthetic.  According to the packet inserts and the PDR, it contains benzyl alcohol as a preservative.  In November, 1988, the French medical journal, Dev Pharmacol Ther, published a paper on benzyl alcohol metabolism and elimination in infants. The report stated, "...we cannot directly answer the issue of safety of ‘low doses’ of benzyl alcohol as found in some medications administered to neonates. This study confirms the immaturity of the benzoic acid detoxification process in premature newborns."

Vitamin K vacciness also contain hydrochloric acid "for pH adjustment." Roche’s vitamin K product KONAKION contains ingredients such as phenol, propylene glycol (derived from petroleum and used as an antifreeze and in hydraulic brake fluid) and acetic acid (an astringent antimicrobial agent that may drastically reduce the amount of natural vitamin K that would have otherwise been produced in the digestive tract).  Phenol is a carbolic acid and is a poisonous substance which is distilled from coal tar.  It has the ability to inhibit phagocyte activity, meaning it is toxic to all cells. Phenol is capable of disabling the immune system's primary response mechanism. It can also cause systemic poisoning, headache, shock, weakness, convulsions, kidney damage, cardiac failure, kidney failure, or death.  Propylene glycol can cause serious damage to liver, heart and central nervous system. 

The inoculations exceed an infants recommended daily dietary intake by over 100 percent.  Peer reviewed journals have linked large doses of vitamin K to childhood cancers and leukemia. Animal studies have linked large doses of vitamin K to a variety of conditions that include anemia, liver damage, kidney damage and death.

There is possibly an 80 percent increased risk of developing childhood leukemia. Several controlled studies have shown this correlation to be most likely the case while many others suggest that it is unlikely.  Six different studies suggest it is a 10 percent or 20 percent increased risk.

Cancer researchers say that the synthetic vitamin K vaccine may significantly increase the risk of childhood cancer.  Researchers in 1990 noted an increased incidence of childhood cancer in children given vitamin K inoculations at birth. They also found that the vitamin K injection doubled the incidence of leukemia in children less than ten years of age. A study in 1992 revealed the same association between injected vitamin K and cancer.  Literature reveals that there are 1.5 extra cases of leukemia per 100,000 children due to vitamin K injections.

Recent studies in England have pointed out an increased risk of childhood leukemia with Vitamin K inoculations.  Numerous studies have failed to dispute the statistical link.

Britain started a national cohort study of 16,193 infants born in one week in April in 1970.  Thirty-three of the children had developed cancer by age 10 and were compared with 99 control children. The authors of the study approached Roche, the manufacturers of Konakion, for funding for a further trial to examine the findings more closely. Naturally Roche was not interested until, a few months later, the media reported the results of the study and that vitamin K given to babies might cause childhood cancer. The new study was a case-control study of 195 children with cancer born at either of two hospitals in Bristol, England, compared with 588 healthy children also born at these hospitals. One hospital administered vitamin K orally and the other intramuscularly.  A nearly two-fold risk of leukaemia was found in children who had received intramuscular vitamin K.

Golding calculated that the extra cases of leukaemia caused by vitamin K injection could be as many as 980 in the UK alone. These results were supported by reports of the potential carcinogenicity of vitamin K from Israels et al. Pizer et al concluded that his study was too small to show any real effect. After an intramuscular dose of vitamin K, the baby’s plasma levels are almost 9000 times the normal adult levels.   Many criticized Golding’s study. Despite the fact that assumptions were made for some cases because administration of vitamin K was not accurately recorded, expert epidemiologists considered that the results were plausible and so they could not be dismissed even in the slightest.

Two studies had carefully matched controls and more accurate information on whether vitamin K had been given or not, and by which route. One of the studies reported no association between intramuscular vitamin K and childhood cancer and the other found a risk of leukaemia, but only when cases were compared with local controls (i.e. from the same hospital) and not with controls randomly selected from the whole area under study. This was dismissed. It was then assumed and decided that worries about any potential cancer risk should be abandoned.

At that time, four more studies on vitamin K and cancer were in progress. The results were published in 1998.  One of the studies showed a twofold risk of acute lymphoblastic leukaemia among 1-6 year olds, another showed a significant risk for all cancers.

There are two problems in giving vitamin K orally.  It is not a licensed oral formulation for one.  Compliance with three oral doses is low since many physicians are reluctant to give an unlicensed formula. The use of unlicensed preparations could lead to litigation in the event of prophylactic failure or adverse events.

Roche, the manufacturers of Konakion, state that they do not recommend the administration of Konakion solution orally. Their reasons are:

• that they have no clinical studies to support oral use,
• phenol, which has been reported to be an irritant to newborns mouths, is used as a preservative,
• the variability in the production of bile salts in newborns may affect absorption,
• that Konakion given orally has a small association with anaphylactic reactions.

The oral formula is distasteful and infants would instinctively spit it out or regurgitate it resulting in only half of an orally administered dose being absorbed. Still, the plasma concentrations in babies who were given oral vitamin K reached 300 times the adult levels, before dropping off slightly after about 24 hours.

The number of children currently developing cancer during childhood is much higher than the number developing a life threatening or permanently disabling problem as a result of late onset HDN. The risk of childhood cancer is estimated to be 1.4 per 1000, from the 1970 British cohort.   (Yet,  it is difficult to determine amongst all pediatric cancer patients if they developed their life threatening condition from vitamin K injection, the polio or other by other vaccines  containing foreign RNA and DNA).

The only known reported cases of vitamin K toxicity result from having used the synthetic inoculated form.  Vitam K inoculations can cause possibly fatal allergic reactions even during injection. The risks of injecting vitamin K into a newborn baby are nerve or muscle damage because it is injected deeply into the muscle, not subcutaneously under the skin.

On the product insert, some reactions are listed: You may notice pain, swelling and tenderness at the injection site for a few days. Notify your doctor if you experience any of the following while taking this drug: chest pain, flushing, strange movements, rapid pulse, tightness of the chest, cramps. In the unlikely event you have an allergic reaction to this drug, seek medical attention immediately. nerve and muscle damage as the Vitamin K injection must be given deeply into the muscle.   However, should a newborn experience any of these, it is incredibly difficult for them to “notify” anyone, difficult for the parents to see or understand the reason behind a newborns cries, and difficult for physicians to see these signs in infants.   Majority of physicians are not educated or trained to fully examin an infant in discomfort for vaccine related symptoms.  Instead, they are most likely to dismiss any vaccination link.

The following are from the vaccine product insert:

• Clinical Pharmacology: "little is known about the metabolic fate of Vitamin K".
• Contraindication: "Hypersensitivity to any component of this medication".
• Precautions: "Studies of carcinogenicity, mutagenesis, or impairment of fertility have not been conducted with phytonadione."
• Pediatric Use: "Hemolysis, jaundice, and hyperbiliruminemia in newborns, particularly in premature infants, may be related to the dose of phytonadione."
• Adverse reactions: "Deaths have occurred after intravenous administration…The possibility of allergic sensitivity should be kept in mind…Hyperbilirubinemia has been observed in the newborn following administration of phytonadione…"

Newborns are not pre-screened for allergic hypersensitivity.

Vitamin K1 in the form of Phytonadione, is a popular medication used to promote blood clotting. Preparations of Phytonadione are sold under trade names Mephyton, AquaMephyton, and Konakion.

Vitamin K is not a clotting agent in itself, and Vitamin K levels are not measured directly; only levels of other blood proteins with known dependence on Vitamin K

Jaundice is a common symptom of Vitamin K overdose. A recent pediatric statistic indicated the presence of clinical jaundice in more than half of all infants. Vitamin K shots are administered within an hour or so after birth. Clinical jaundice presents itself in the first few days after birth.

Tulchinsky paper: It was found that 12 of the 34 newborns (35%) whose medical records were reviewed already received a Vitamin K injection before presentation of any hemorrhaging symptoms. 16 of the newborns (47%) received Vitamin K after the onset of hemorrhagic symptoms. 6 newborns (18%) had no mention of Vitamin K in their medical records.

It was assumed that injection of Vitamin K had not been given if medical records contained no mention of it, even though the practice was popular at the time.  There is no mandate to maintain accurate medical records of Vitamin K injection making the assumption worthy of great concern.

Then, in the mid-1950’s, circulating reports of increased jaundice and kernicterus (brain damage caused by high bilirubin levels) in infants given vitamin K prophylaxis began resulting in wide spread concern and lack of confidence in the procedure.  Reviews of maternity units found that some were giving Synkavite in doses exceeding 50mg. It was established that high doses of Synkavite caused haemolysis (destruction of red blood cells) and high serum bilirubin levels.

Researchers and medical professionals questioned the safety aspects of vitamin K, and there were many conflicting reports on the appropriate dosages. Some researchers questioned the need for vitamin K at all.

Eventually, a newer preparation, intramuscular vitamin K1 (phytomenadione), was developed and approved with the presumption that it appeared to cause less haemolysis. Phytomenadione (trade names Konakion (Roche) or Aquamephyton (Merck, Sharpe & Dohme)) is a synthetic petrochemical derived from 2-methyl 1,4-naptha-quinone in a polyethoxylated castor oil base. In the US, polysorbate-80 is used as a base instead of polyethoxylated castor oil.

Despite the lack of long term trials of these formulations, the American Academy of Pediatrics recommended that phytomenadione be administered prophylactically to all newborn babies. The intramuscular route  was deemed safer.

Merck’s 1998 PDR entry for AquaMEPHYTON has removed adverse reaction liability by stating, "The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recommends that Vitamin K1 be given to the newborn."

Infant Formulas are supplemented with unnaturally high levels of vitamin K.   The breastfed infant can be supplemented with several low oral doses of liquid vitamin K1 (possibly 200 micrograms per week for five weeks, totaling 1 milligram, even more gradual introduction may be better). Alternatively, the nursing mother can take vitamin K supplements daily or twice weekly for 10 weeks. (This does not alter fetal levels but supplementation of the nursing mother does increase breast milk and infant levels.)

Either of these provides a much safer rate of vitamin K supplementation. Maternal supplementation of 2.5 mg per day, recommended by one author, provides a higher level of vitamin K through breast milk than does formula. Formula provides 10 times the U.S. recommended daily allowance.

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