Vitamin K is a factor that is necessary for blood to coagulate.
Vitamin is K produced by the liver and intestinal flora, starting about age 3 months. Dietary sources include liver, milk, and leafy greens. Most newborns have very little Vitamin K, but they don’t need it. unless there’s a cut or puncture.
Newborns must learn to protect themselves from bleeding to death from punctures and cuts. During the first 6 months the body develops the clotting cascade: a series of physiological steps the blood must perform once the signal goes out that there’s a laceration somewhere. This process requires at least 13 Factors for coagulation to occur. One of these factors is Vitamin K.
For most infants, it takes about 6 months to organize all the components needed for coagulation – none of which involves injections. Generally, the immune system learns to maintain blood integrity (hemostasis) with only tiny amounts of Vitamin K.
Vitamin K injection for newborns was actually a brilliant marketing scheme dreamed up in 2002 by the MBA’s upstairs. How many 6 month old infants were dying from bleeding to death at that time? Virtually none. Vitamin K shots for neonates followed the typical medical agenda: monetize every possible nuance of pregnancy, successfully turning childbirth and childhood into medical emergencies.
And what do we have for our contestants, Bill? We now have (fanfare please) Vitamin K shots!
People don’t need much persuasion to be talked into another shot. Nobody reads. If the doctor says you need a shot, most do it. The body is a car, right? So the sales rationale from 2002 is that since the newborn’s liver cannot produce vitamin K yet, we have to inject them with a manmade, synthetic version. Even though most infants develop normal clotting ability by 6 months of age.
99.9% of the time, the only cuts or punctures they endure are — what? vaccines and Vitamin K injections!
Side effects of the injection? One of the most popular formulations of Vitamin K is called Mephyton {phytonadione} ( PDR, 2007 p 2018) [2,4]
After making the ludicrous claim that this synthetic produces “the same type of activity as the natural vitamin K,” Merck then lists these as possible adverse reactions:
• anaphylactic shock
• death
• dizziness
• cyanosis (turning blue)
• apnea
• allergic reactions
Some popular Vitamin K injections contain aluminum, for which there is no safe dose:
The CDC cites 2 studies from the 1990s in which a causal relationship between vitamin K injections and child leukemia is demonstrated. [Vitamin K https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3021393/]
Extensive follow up studies were then done to disprove the connection. Results of the follow-up studies: inconclusive. So that relationship is more than possible.
To further market the unnecessary injections, and add yet another billing code, researchers came up with a test to determine vitamin K “deficiency”. According to NIH, the primary source of neonatal vitamin K deficiency is from drugs taken by the mother, especially antibiotics, anticonvulsives, and barbiturates.
Another shocking fact your pediatrician will never tell you: NIH only recommends Vitamin K injections for those who show up “deficient” by the testing. [1, 3] But all that was much too time-consuming, and limited the bottom line. So very soon and forever after, the injections have now become routine – for every baby.
See the pharmaceutical merry-go-round they have us all on? Easy to step off, but sheep are not known for their self reliance or initiative.
Now don’t forget: Vitamin K injections, even if they were necessary, are not the naturally existing human blood Factor equivalent, but rather manmade synthetics, derived from another drug: quinone. No way are they :bio-identical” no matter what the OB/GYN brochures say.
That should be obvious, since natural vitamin K in your body has none of the above side effects!
Here’s where science and marketing diverge from common sense. Take all these facts into consideration:
1. The only reason the infant would need vitamin K would be in case of a laceration or puncture, inducing bleeding.
2. The Vitamin K injection is a puncture. As are all vaccines.
3. There was no epidemic of infants bleeding to death in 2002
4. Vitamin K shots are synthetic, with serious, possibly fatal side effects
The introduction of Vitamin K injections was all theoretical, all marketing for the bottom line on the Final Bill when mother and child are discharged. That’s authentic American Medicine – first last and always – a For Profit industry.
References:
1. Vitamin K in neonates: facts and myths Blood Transfusion 2011 Jan; 9(1): 4–9.
PMCID: PMC3021393 PMID: 21084009
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3021393/
2. Physicians Desk Reference, 2007 p2018 Mephyton (Merck)
3. CDC: Facts About Vitamin K Deficiency
https://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/vitamink/facts.html
4. RXList: Mephyton
https://www.rxlist.com/mephyton-drug/patient-images-side-effects.htm
