Exposure to toxic metals is often behind some of today’s most common chronic conditions — and there’s one safe, proven, and effective way to rid the body of those metals.

So naturally, it’s coming under attack.

In a stunning display of ignorance, the American College of Medical Toxicology is urging doctors to reject time-tested chelation therapy. And at a recent conference hosted by the CDC, the group actually called on its members to report doctors who use it.

I’m not sure what they’re supposed to report, since chelation isn’t illegal. In fact, it’s the FDA-approved treatment for the removal of heavy metals such as lead from the body.

The fact that they want doctors to start tattling on other doctors who use this perfectly legal treatment is bad enough. But what makes this so much worse is the fact that the Federation of State Medical Boards sent representatives to the conference, according to a report from the Alliance for Natural Health.

That’s a sign that other states could soon follow Kentucky’s lead and put a backdoor ban on chelation therapy by forbidding doctors from discussing it with their patients.

In Kentucky, simply talking about this legal treatment can get your license yanked — so if you’re a patient who lives in that state and actually needs chelation, be prepared to drive a long way (or move).

What’s amazing about all this is that there isn’t a single doctor — mainstream or alternative — who will claim mercury, lead, arsenic, and more belong in the body.

There’s total agreement that they’re poisons.

The disagreement comes over what they do at what levels. The mainstream takes an all-or-nothing approach here, claiming that very high levels of metals are toxic and deadly and should be removed through chelation.

But lower levels — even levels just below that “poison” threshold — are perfectly safe and require nothing at all.

That’s what they say, anyway. But science (and common sense) tell us otherwise: A toxin dangerous enough to kill you at high levels could hurt you at lower ones, and studies have implicated even low levels of these metals in everything from osteoarthritis to heart disease to autism. And clinical experience tells me that everyone’s genetic ability to detoxify these metals varies greatly.

If you’re battling a chronic illness that your own physician hasn’t been able to solve, visit a holistic doctor who can test your levels of these metals.

You might be surprised by the results — and how quickly you can be cured. But you’d better hurry… this cure might not be around much longer.

Most nutrients are not only safe in high amounts, they’re necessary — because too many people simply don’t get nearly enough of the essentials from diet alone.

But it’s also possible to get too much of a good thing, and a new study shows one of the risks of going overboard with iron. This essential mineral, so crucial to your health, could actually contribute to Alzheimer’s disease if you get too much.

In a series of experiments, lab rabbits given a high-cholesterol diet saw increases in their levels of iron in the brain. And as the iron built up, so did the amount of amyloid-beta plaques linked to dementia.

Amyloid-beta alone is a huge red flag, but it wasn’t the only dementia risk factor that cropped up. At the same time, a neuron protein called tau began a process called phosphorylation.

I don’t want to get too technical here, but that’s another big warning sign of dementia.

That’s the bad news.

Here’s the good news: When the bunnies were given the same exact treatment we give humans for excess iron — chelation, in this case with a chelating agent called deferiprone — blood levels of both cholesterol and iron fell and the amyloid beta and phosphorylated tau began to disappear.

Brain levels of iron didn’t fall — only levels in the blood, which is to be expected. And apparently, that alone was enough to do the trick.

Now, I treat people — not bunnies. But I test all my patients for excess iron because you don’t have to have floppy ears and a love of carrots to face the risks. Too much iron over time can cause or contribute to any number of conditions, including heart disease and cancer.

And while you’ve probably heard of iron deficiency anemia, most people have never heard of hereditary hemochromatosis — a genetic disorder in which the body stockpiles iron, allowing it to build up to dangerous levels.

It’s a lot more common than you’d think.

Have your holistic doctor check your own levels of iron — and if they’re too high, make like a bunny and seek a treatment that involves regular blood draws.

I’ve diagnosed a number of patients with this condition the past 18 years, and I can’t tell you how grateful they were since it resolved their fatigue and joint pain, both common symptoms of this condition.

It greatly reduced their risk of complications like early heart disease and cancer.

One of the most common mistakes I see people making is that they take iron supplements or multivitamins with iron, thinking it will help their fatigue. This is a mistake. Don’t take iron unless you’ve been diagnosed as being iron deficient via a blood test.

Any time I use the words “soda” and “study” in the same sentence, it’s never good news for soda. I can’t recall a single study that shows soda benefits anything other than the bank accounts of the people who sell it.

And the latest research is no exception.

A new look at data on 42,883 men between the ages of 40 and 75 finds that those who drank the most sugary drinks had a 20 percent higher risk of a heart attack during the 22-year study — a link that held even after adjusting for risk factors such as smoking, activity levels and a family history of heart problems.

What’s more, the researchers found that for each serving of a sugary drink you down in a day — like one 12-ounce cola — your risk of cardiovascular disease is boosted by 19 percent.

In addition, the men who drank the most sugary drinks also had lower levels of HDL cholesterol — that’s the good stuff — and higher levels of deadly triglycerides.

Think that’s bad? Hold on — because the study in Circulation gets even worse: Men who drank the most soda had the highest levels of C-reactive protein, or CRP. That’s an inflammation marker that can mean anything from heart disease to cancer to an autoimmune disorder.

But none of this should be surprising, since all of these problems have been linked to sugar before — and drinks are one of the biggest sources of sugar in the modern diet.

A single can of soda, for example, has roughly 40 grams of the sweet stuff. That’s like going to Starbucks and ordering a “tall” (or what the rest of us call a “small”) 12-ounce coffee… and putting 10 sugars into it.

It’s an insane amount of sugar.

For some incredible visuals on just how much of it is in each can, bottle, and Big Gulp, check out the images on the “Sugar Stacks” website.

All that sweet stuff is bound to play havoc with your body. Along with all the risks I mentioned earlier, even a moderate soda habit can cause your blood sugar levels to spike — eventually leading to metabolic syndrome and even diabetes.

Don’t fall into the trap of thinking you’ll be any safer switching to diet either. Other studies have found that diet soda drinkers actually gain weight — and at least one study linked diet soft drinks to an increased heart risk of its own, along with an increased risk of stroke.

I’m not done with soda yet — keep reading for more.

One of the worst things in your food and drink isn’t an ingredient at all — not in the usual sense, anyway. It’s a hormone-like chemical used in the packaging.

It’s called bisphenol-A, or BPA for short, and the problem is that it doesn’t remain inside the packaging. It leeches out into your food and drink, giving you a small-but-steady hormone boost with every swallow.

BPA has been linked to dozens of health risks, and the latest research adds another to the list: heart disease.

British researchers compared the records of 758 patients who were healthy at the start of a 10-year study, but went on to develop heart disease, to 861 people who remained free of the disease the entire time.

And as it turned out, the heart disease patients had higher overall urine levels of BPA at the start of the study.

That alone doesn’t prove that BPA causes heart disease, but other studies have also found a link between the two — and if that’s not enough to scare you away, consider all of the other risks.

This chemical, which mimics estrogen inside the body, has been linked to obesity, diabetes, and sexual problems — including problems with sperm counts, concentration, vitality, and motility.

And in children, BPA has been linked to developmental problems, behavioral problems, early puberty and more, especially in kids who were exposed in the womb.

Getting rid of BPA isn’t easy, since this chemical is used in most food-grade plastics. It’s even used in the linings of metal cans and the caps of sealed glass jars.

You can see where this is going, right? The best way to slash your levels is to switch to the foods you should be eating anyway — and that means nothing that comes from a package or container of any kind.

One study I told you about last year showed that switching to a diet of organic fresh foods slashed BPA levels by 60 percent in just three days.

But don’t stop at three days. Make it a permanent habit, and you could bring your BPA levels down even further — and boost your health and the health of your entire family at the same time, since you’ll be eating better, too.