Can you eat clay

Answer 1

Per Wikipedia:

• Bentonite-type clay has been used to treat infections, indigestion, and other medical problems by both applying wet clay topically to the skin as a poultice, and by ingesting it. Bentonite has been prescribed as a bulk laxative, and it is also used as a base for many dermatologic formulas.Dermatologically, it is used as part of a treatment for pruritis. Also, bentonite can be used as a therapeutic face pack for the treatment of acne/oily skin. Clearasil, an acne cream, uses bentonite as an agent to absorb excess sebum, clearing pores.
• Montmorillonite is the main constituent of bentonite.
• Attapulgite or palygorskite is a very absorbent clay, somewhat similar to bentonite. When used in medicine, it physically binds to acids and toxic substances in the stomach and digestive tract. For this reason, it has been used in several anti-diarrheal medications.
• Kaolin is not as absorbent as most clays used medicinally (it has a low shrink-swell capacity). Also, it has a low cation exchange capacity. This clay is also known as 'white cosmetic clay'. Clay, in the form of kaolin, is still a common ingredient in western medicines such as Rolaids and Maalox, as well as in cosmetics.

Also per Wikipedia:

• Kaolinite is a clay mineral, part of the group of industrial minerals, with the chemical composition Al2Si2O5(OH)4. It is a layered silicate mineral, with one tetrahedral sheet linked through oxygen atoms to one octahedral sheet of alumina octahedra. Rocks that are rich in kaolinite are known as kaolin or China clay. The name is derived from Kao-ling (Chinese: 高陵/高嶺; pinyin: Gaoling), a town near Jingdezhen, Jiangxi province, China.

According to Drugs.com:

• Kaolin has traditionally been used internally to control diarrhea. Kaolin has also been used topically as an emollient and drying agent. Specifically, it has been used to dry oozing and weeping poison ivy, poison oak, and poison sumac lesions. It has also been used as a protectant for the temporary relief of anorectal itching and diaper rash.
• Kaolin has been used commercially and medicinally for hundreds of years. It is currently used in the manufacture of pottery, bricks, cement, ceramics, paints, plastering material, color lakes (insoluble dyes), and insulators. As a raw material, it is commonly found in paper, plastics, cosmetics, and pharmaceuticals, and it is also used in pharmaceutical preparations as a filtering agent to clarify liquids. Evidence also suggests that kaolin may be useful in the decolorization of dye wastewater via the electrocoagulation method. When applied topically, it serves as an emollient and drying agent. When ingested, it acts as an adsorbent to bind GI toxins and control diarrhea.
• Antidiarrheal preparations containing kaolin have been used in the treatment of enteritis, cholera, and dysentery. Kaolin preparations, however, have no intrinsic antibacterial activity and should not be used as the sole treatment in infectious diarrheas.

The original Kaopectate was composed of kaolin and pectin but the ingredients were changed to bismuth subsalicylate, the active ingredient in Pepto-Bismol.