Please watch this movie, and ask yourself - Could it be B12? And a supplement for Anhydrosis

Because your horse depends on you to take care of him/her/it. Also: COBALT? WAIT, WHAT? My horse isn't sweating, and I'm too tired...

I was innocently ordering some magnesium for the dragon when I noticed Horse Tech sells a product called Sweatwerks. For anhydrosis. And I assumed the key ingredient was iodine, and I was going to look at the reviews to see how well people were saying it worked (5 stars across the board). Surprise #1: It’s been on the market since 2016. Surprise #2: It only has 2 mg of iodine per serving, a standard dose for horse ration balancers. Surprise #3: It has 4 times as much cobalt as iodine. Eight mg. Ingredients include Cobalt Glucoheptonate and Vitamin B12 Supplement.

I asked Chatgpt this question:

is there another function for Cobalt in the mammalian body aside from vitamin B12

Chatgpt: Yes, cobalt has another function in the mammalian body aside from being a central component of vitamin B12. It plays a role in the proper functioning of red blood cells and is involved in the synthesis of hemoglobin, the molecule responsible for carrying oxygen in the blood. Cobalt, as a trace mineral, is essential for maintaining healthy blood and proper cell function.

However, its most prominent and essential role is as part of vitamin B12 (cobalamin), which is crucial for DNA synthesis, nerve function, and red blood cell production. Without cobalt, vitamin B12 would not exist in its functional form, so while cobalt itself has a direct role in red blood cell function, its contribution is largely tied to the presence of vitamin B12 in the body.

I have a feeling chatgpt is wrong about this. I think cobalt is only useful as part of the B12 molecule. A quick look at a couple of articles supports that position. Here is one article about it in people.

https://ajcn.nutrition.org/article/S0002-9165(23)04994-8/fulltext.

Of course, B12 could be synthesized in the gut microbiome, so cobalt might be used that way. Absorption post synthesis is the problem. Anyone want to discuss this with Horse Tech? I think it is a great company, and I am just going to leave it at that.

Are you yourself deficient in Vitamin B12?

I spent several weeks, maybe months, arguing with my chiro about why I couldn’t be deficient in B12. He kept saying “but, pernicious anemia.” Then my sister tested positive for autoimmune pernicious anemia, and now I got the lab order for testing. Definitely runs in families. My chiro kept telling me to read the book “Could it be B12? An Epidemic of Misdiagnosis“ so he finally gave up on that and gave me a movie link:

Lovely engaging movie. A biography of Sally Pacholok, who wrote the book after a decades long campaign to get the hospital she worked in to test patients’ B12 status.

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/could-it-be-b12-sally-m-pacholok/1117993496

https://www.audiobooksnow.com/audiobook/could-it-be-b12/2957086/?msclkid=ede9f1abf5f311bf58d396d37b6f820a

OK, my dears, I would love to sit here and try to look smart, but #1 it’s probably not going to work, and #2 I have to get going.

Sweatwerks reviews:

https://horsetech.com/sweatwerks