Saturday, January 26, 2008
1945 Human Experiment Predicted Current Fluoride Health Woes
In 1955, ten years into the experiment, researchers reported more bone defects, anemia and earlier female menstruation in children purposely dosed with sodium fluoride-laced drinking water (1956. Journal of the American Dental Association). This is the first, and only, fluoridation human health experiment and it was carried out on the entire population in the city of Newburgh NY.
How did this happen?
In the early 1900’s, brown and yellow discolored, but decay resistant, teeth were prevalent in healthier, wealthier U.S. populations drinking and irrigating their crops with naturally calcium-fluoridated water.
Researchers discovered fluoride was the tooth discoloring culprit and mistakenly thought fluoride was also the cavity-fighting hero – unaware that calcium was required to grow sound dentition. And also unaware of Dentist Weston Price’s extensive research published in 1939 showing that without fluoride, healthier populations had healthier teeth because of good diets.
Public health officials, so sure sodium fluoride safely benefited children’s teeth, had no misgivings about carrying out this very unusual experiment without first doing animal studies, without informed consent and without thought or interest about how sodium fluoride could afflict adults.
Mistakenly assuming all fluorides are the same, in 1945, sodium fluoride, waste products from industries such as Alcoa Aluminum Company (not natural calcium-fluoride), was added to Newburgh NY’s water supply at about one milligram fluoride per liter of water. Kingston NY, the control city for comparison purposes, was left fluoride-free.
Kingston and Newburgh are thirty-five miles apart on the Hudson River in New York State and in 1940 had populations of 31,956 and 28,817, respectively. In Newburgh, 500 children were examined after ten years and 405 in Kingston. Adults were never tested.
Although planned to last ten years, due to political pressure, the Newburgh/Kingston study was declared a success after five years which caused many U.S. cities to start fluoridation prematurely.
Newburgh's children were given complete physicals and x-rays, over the course of the study, from birth to age nine in the first year and up to age eighteen in the final year.
“(R)outine laboratory studies were omitted in the control group during most of the study, they were included in the final examination,” according to Schlesinger and colleagues, in “Newburgh-Kingston caries-fluorine study XIII. Pediatric findings after ten years.”
The researchers report after ten years of fluoridation in Newburgh New York:
-- “The average age at the menarche was 12 years among the girls studied in Newburgh and 12 years 5 months among the girls in Kingston.”
--Hemoglobin (iron-containing part of a red blood cell): “a few more children in the range below 12.9 grams per hundred milliliters in Newburgh”
--“…a slightly higher proportion of children in Newburgh were found to have a total erythrocyte (red blood cell) count below 4,400,000 per milliliter”
--Knee X-rays of Newburgh children reveals more cortical bone defects, and irregular mineralization of the thigh bone.
Only twenty-five Newburgh children had eye and ear exams. Two had hearing loss; eight had abnormal vision. Even though researchers discovered more adult cataracts in surveys conducted before 1944 in communities with naturally high water fluoride concentrations Newburg and Kingston adults were never checked for this defect.
Only two groups of twelve-year-old boys were tested for fluoride’s toxic kidney effects.
In a statewide survey conducted in 1954, J. A. Forst, M.D a New York public health official reported observing one-third more dental defects, including malposition of teeth, in fluoridated Newburgh, New York, than in the non-fluoridated control city of Kingston.
The 2004 book "The Fluoride Deception," by Christopher Bryson, reveals that in addition to NYS Dep't of Health examinations “the University of Rochester conducted its own studies, measuring how much fluoride Newburgh citizens retained in their blood and tissues. Health Department personnel cooperated, shipping blood and placenta samples to the Rochester scientists,” writes Bryson. Three times as much fluoride was found in the placentas and blood samples gathered from Newburgh as from non-fluoridated Rochester, reports Bryson.
Following back the scientific references in all current fluoridation safety literature will invariably lead back to the Newburgh/Kingston study which actually failed to prove fluoridation is safe for all who drink it although public health officials and dentists tell a different story..
On January 25, 1945, Grand Rapids Michigan was actually the first U.S. city to fluoridate; without health effects measured.. Even that study is scientifically dishonest. After five years tooth decay declined equally in Grand Rapids and its control city Muskegon Michigan so Muskegon’s water was fluoridated which actually invalidated this experiment.
So it’s not surprising that a toxicological review of current fluoride science by the prestigious National Academies shows that fluoride jeopardizes health - even at low levels deliberately added to public water supplies. Fluoride poses risks to the thyroid
gland, diabetics, kidney patients, high water drinkers and others and can severely damage children's teeth. Further studies linking fluoride to cancer and lowered IQ are plausible, they report.
In 1998, the New York Department of Health reported that fluoridated Newburgh NY children have more cavities and more fluorosis than never fluoridated Kingston NY children.(Figure 1, Page 41, "Recommendations for Fluoride Use in children"
NYS Dental Journal, February 1998 (NYS Department of Health).
References:
Fluoridation researcher, Peter Meiers, has more information about the Newburgh/Kingston study on his website:
http://www.fluoride-history.de/bartlett.htm
Newburgh-Kingston caries-fluorine study. XIII. Pediatric findings after ten years.
J Am Dent Assoc. 1956 Mar;52(3):296-306. SCHLESINGER ER, OVERTON DE, CHASE HC, CANTWELL KT.
http://fluoridedangers.blogspot.com/2006/01/human-experiment-predicts-fluoride.html
"In making comparisonson these data it should be remembered that Muskegon started fluoridation in July 1951"
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/picrender.fcgi?artid=1551218&blobtype=pdf
Tuesday, May 15, 2007
Dentists Are Big Fat Liars
May 10, 2007
Dentists Are Big Fat Liars
By Sally Stride
Dentists have been very derelict in their duty to educate Americans about the real reason why they are getting more cavities. Poor nutrition and too much fluoride.
Sufficient intakes of protein, calcium, phosphorus, vitamins A, C, and D are required to form healthy teeth, according to the American Dental Association.
Most cavities happen in poor children. Poor children are deficient in almost all of the above nutrients, according to the Centers for Disease Control. Low Income Americans are also less likely to be able to afford nutrient dense fruits and vegetables to satisfy the 7-9 servings required daily to keep healthy.
There are zero, nada, zip, NO studies showing any American child is fluoride deficient. In fact, the opposite is true. Loads of studies show American Children get way over recommended levels of fluoride from many sources - not just drinking water. And there is NO dispute between those for and against fluoridation that too much fluoride is harmful and can actually damage teeth (dental fluorosis).
In fact, the American Dental Association and the Centers for Disease Control, recognizing this problem, both advise that infant formulas should not be mixed with fluoridated water to avoid dental fluorosis which now occurs in about 50% of
Fluoride is inhaled via ocean mist, cold mist humidifiers, showers, and air pollution. It's a component of cigarette smoke, coal burning, brick, fertilizer, aluminum and other industrial air emissions. Fluoride is naturally high in tea and ocean fish and, because of fluoride containing pesticide residues, in some grape juices. Fluoride is in chicken baby food in concentrations high enough to cause dental fluorosis in the child if consumed daily. Any product made with mechanically deboned chicken such as chicken nuggets,
Since the EPA now allows sulfuryl fluoride to be used as a fumigant on many foods, even more foods will contain fluoride.
Unfortunately, most dentists compelling us to drink more fluoride don't know this and won't be able to discern when and how you've reach fluoride saturation.
Dentists are holding our poor children hostage and won't actually treat their dental disease unless the government gives them more money. In my opinion, they should be fined or sued for allowing this dental health crisis to occur on their watch.
Fluoridation is just a diversion to distract you from the real tragedy facing the poor - lack of dentists who really care.
If a dentist says your child requires more fluoride, he or she is either lying or fluoride-ignorant.
Authors Website: http://www.fluoridedangers.blogspot.com
Friday, February 16, 2007
Fluoride Not Reducing Cavities
presented in a recent National Academy of Sciences' (NAS) National Research Council (NRC) report.
Monday, May 15, 2006
Fluoride Expert: Fluoride Perilous
"In my opinion, the evidence that fluoridation is more harmful than beneficial is now overwhelming and policy makers who avoid thoroughly reviewing recent data before introducing new fluoridation schemes do so at risk of future litigation," writes Limeback.
Dr. Limeback was one of the 12 scientists who served on the National Academy of Sciences panel that issued the 2006 report, "Fluoride in Drinking Water: A Scientific Review of the EPA's Standards." Dr. Limeback a dentist, researcher and an associate professor of dentistry and head of the preventive dentistry program at the University of Toronto.
The argument against fluoridation is strong when all the points listed below are taken together.
1. Fluoridation is no longer effective.
Fluoride in water has the effect of delaying tooth eruption and, therefore, simply delays dental decay (Komarek et al, 2005, Biostatistics 6:145-55). The studies that water fluoridation work are over 25 years old and were carried out before the widespread use of fluoridated toothpaste. There are numerous modern studies to show that there no longer is a difference in dental decay rates between fluoridated and non-fluoridated areas, the most recent one in Australia (Armfield & Spencer, 2004 Community Dental Oral Epidemiology. 32:283-96). Recent water fluoridation cessation studies show that dental fluorosis (a mottling of the enamel caused by fluoride) declines but there is no corresponding increase in dental decay (e.g. Maupome et al 2001, Community Dental Oral Epidemiology 29: 37-47).
Public health services will claim there is a dental decay crisis. With the national average in the U.S. of only two decayed teeth per child (World Health Organization data), down from more than 15 decayed teeth in the 1940s and 1950s before fluoridated toothpaste, as much as half of all children grow up not having a single filling. This remarkable success has been achieved in other developed countries without fluoridation. The "crisis" of dental decay in the U.S. often mentioned is the result, to a major extent, of sugar abuse, especially soda pop. A 2005 report by Jacobsen of the Center for Science in the Public Interest said that U.S. children consume 40 to 44 percent of their daily refined sugar in the form of soft drinks. Since most soft drinks are themselves fluoridated, the small amount of fluoride is obviously not helping.
The families of these children with rampant dental decay need professional assistance. Are they getting it? Children who grow up in low-income families make poor dietary choices, and cannot afford dental care. Untreated dental decay and lack of professional intervention result in more dental decay. The York review was unable to show that fluoridation benefited poor people.
Similarly, early dental decay in nursing infants (baby bottle syndrome) cannot be prevented with water fluoridation. The majority of dentists in the U.S. do not accept Medicaid patients because they lose money treating these patients. Dentists support fluoridation programs because it absolves them of their responsibility to provide assistance to those who cannot afford dental treatment. Even cities where water fluoridation has been in effect for years are reporting similar dental "crises."
Public health officials responsible for community programs are misleading the public by stating that ingesting fluoride "makes the teeth stronger." Fluoride is not an essential nutrient. It does not make developing teeth better prepared to resist dental decay before they erupt into the oral environment. The small benefit that fluoridated water might still have on teeth (in the absence of fluoridated toothpaste use) is the result of "topical" exposure while the teeth are rebuilding from acid challenges brought on by daily sugar and starch exposure (Limeback 1999, Community Dental Oral Epidemiology 27: 62-71), and this has now been recognized by the Centers for Disease Control.
2. Fluoridation is the main cause of dental fluorosis.
Fluoride doses by the end user can't be controlled when only one concentration of fluoride (1 parts per million) is available in the drinking water. Babies and toddlers get too much fluoride when tap water is used to make formula (Brothwell & Limeback, 2003 Journal of Human Lactation 19: 386-90). Since the majority of daily fluoride comes from the drinking water in fluoridated areas, the risk for dental fluorosis greatly increases (National Academy of Sciences: Toxicological Risk of Fluoride in Drinking Water, 2006).
We have tripled our exposure to fluoride since fluoridation was conceived in the 1940s. This has lead to every third child with dental fluorosis (CDC, 2005). Fluorosis is not just a cosmetic effect. The more severe forms are associated with an increase in dental decay (NAS: Toxicological Risk of Fluoride in Drinking Water, 2006) and the psychological impact on children is a negative one. Most children with moderate and severe dental fluorosis seek extensive restorative work costing thousands of dollars. Dental fluorosis can be reduced by turning off the fluoridation taps without affecting dental decay rates (Burt et al 2000 Journal of Dental Research 79(2):761-9).
3. Chemicals that are used in fluoridation have not been tested for safety.
All the animal cancer studies were done on pharmaceutical-grade sodium fluoride. There is more than enough evidence to show that even this fluoride has the potential to promote cancer. Some communities use sodium fluoride in their drinking water, but even that chemical is not the same fluoride added to toothpaste. Most cities instead use hydrofluorosilicic acid (or its salt). H2SiF6 is concentrated directly from the smokestack scrubbers during the production of phosphate fertilizer, shipped to water treatment plants and trickled directly into the drinking water. It is industrial grade fluoride contaminated with trace amounts of heavy metals such as lead, arsenic and radium, which are harmful to humans at the levels that are being added to fluoridate the drinking water. In addition, using hydrofluorosilicic acid instead of industrial grade sodium fluoride has an added risk of increasing lead accumulation in children (Masters et al 2000, Neurotoxicology. 21(6): 1091- 1099), probably from the lead found in the pipes of old houses. This could not be ruled out by the CDC in their recent study (Macek et al 2006, Environmental Health Perspectives 114:130-134).
4. There are serious health risks from water fluoridation.
Cancer: Osteosarcoma (bone cancer) has recently been identified as a risk in young boys in a recently published Harvard study (Bassin, Cancer Causes and Control, 2006). The author of this study, Dr. Elise Bassin, acknowledges that perhaps it is the use of these untested and contaminated fluorosilicates mentioned above that caused the seven-fold increase risk of bone cancer.
Bone fracture: Drinking on average 1 liter/day of naturally fluoridated water at 4 parts per million increases your risk for bone pain and bone fractures (National Academy of Sciences: Toxicological Risk of Fluoride in Drinking Water, 2006). Since fluoride accumulates in bone, the same risk occurs in people who drink 4 liters/day of artificially fluoridated water at 1 part per million, or in people with renal disease. Fluoridation studies have never properly shown that fluoride is safe in individuals who cannot control their dose, or in patients who retain too much fluoride.
Adverse thyroid function: The recent National Academy of Sciences report (NAS: Toxicological Risk of Fluoride in Drinking Water, 2006) outlines in great detail the detrimental effect that fluoride has on the endocrine system, especially the thyroid. Fluoridation should be halted on the basis that endocrine function in the U.S. has never been studied in relation to total fluoride intake.
Adverse neurological effects: In addition to the added accumulation of lead (a known neurotoxin) in children living in fluoridated cities, fluoride itself is a known neurotoxin. We are only now starting to understand how fluoride affects the brain. While some recent Chinese studies suggest that fluoride in drinking water lowers IQ (NAS, 2006), we need to study this more in depth in North America.
Date of Publication: May 14, 2006 on Page B02
http://www.southcoasttoday.com/daily/05-06/05-14-06/02opinion.htm
Saturday, April 22, 2006
Fluoride Supplements: Don't Use Them
Those patches are fluorosis a condition that shocks many parents because of the cause - too much fluoride. “It was even a bigger surprise to his pediatric dentist - he’s Gradon’s father,” said the Canadian broadcaster. (1)
“We don’t really know how much fluoride it takes to cause fluorosis; and it’s not something we really knew much about ten years ago,” said the Canadian dentist in 1998.
Fluoride overdose symptoms can range from mild, white spots on teeth to moderate and severe fluorosis - yellow, brown or black and sometimes pitted and crumbling teeth.
Things haven’t changed much since 1998. Many American dentists and pediatricians still routinely prescribe fluoride supplements to babies and toddlers believing they prevent tooth decay. Never FDA (U.S. Food and Drug Administration) approved (2), fluoride supplements do more harm than good(8.
Fluoride’s alleged beneficial effects are topical, not systemic as once believed. Scientists discovered old fluoride studies are flawed (3) and that swallowing fluoride discolors teeth but doesn’t reduce tooth decay.
This is why mainstream dental groups such as the Canadian Dental Association, the Western Australia Health Department's Dental Service and the German Scientific Dental Association stopped recommending routine fluoride supplementation. And, if dentists believe children with severe decay must be given a topical fluoride supplement,such as lozenges, dentists are urged to wait until the child is older than 7 years when fluoride will no longer discolor the permanent teeth.
Fluoride was mistakenly discovered as a decay-preventative in the early 1900’s when Americans drinking naturally calcium-fluoridated water supplies displayed cavity-free, discolored teeth. Fluoride stains teeth from the inside. So dentists assumed fluoride prevented cavities, also. But, they overlooked calcium, magnesium and other teeth building components in the water supplies.
Those early studies are dismissed as inaccurate. Still not ready to give up on fluoride, dentists claim fluoride must work topically. However, no well done studies exist comparing cavity rates between similar populations of fluoride users vs. fluoride non users.
Neither a nutrient nor essential to health, fluoride is simply used as a drug to treat tooth decay. Unlike vitamin and mineral supplements often discouraged in favor of a balanced diet, fluoride supplements are encouraged by the medical establishment even though slightly more than recommended leads to adverse effects and no American child is fluoride deficient.
Fluoride is so toxic that children have died from swallowing too much(4).
Knighted fluoride experts by the media and other physicians, dentists often are painfully ignorant about fluoride’s adverse effects and toxicity.
Dental researchers gobble up government grant money to study fluoride but fail to reveal their negative fluoride findings to the tax-paying public and, even more importantly, to the dentists who treat them.
In order to influence California legislators to vote for fluoridation, a dentist swallowed a whole vial of fluoride tablets in front of them and then said ‘Hey, guess what? I’m still alive.’”(5) A similar stunt by a child could have been lethal.
Warnings on the back of fluoridated toothpaste tubes and boxes are there because, if a small child swallowed the whole tube, he or she could die (4). Children died from swallowing too many fluoride pills. One child died after swallowing instead of expectorating his dentist’s fluoride treatment. The dentist didn’t think it was toxic. People have become sickened and died because water engineers injected too much fluoride into water supplies.
Over 65% of America is fluoridated and virtually all Americans consume fluoride in their foods, beverages and dental products. One would expect tooth decay would be obliterated by those fluoridated toothpastes, mouthrinses, supplements, dental treatments, varnishes and water supplies as predicted.
Instead tooth decay rates climb. And so do dental fluorosis rates, with more children displaying moderate and severe symptoms than ever before(6).
The only prediction of future tooth decay is present tooth decay. And the only sure thing linked to extensive tooth decay is poverty.
Prescribing fluoride supplements to toothless or cavity-free children is absolutely ludicrous. Prescribing fluoride to children with loads of cavities won't help. Fixing their diet will have better long term results with only beneficial side effects. Fluoride can't change the consequences of a poor diet.
"The notion that systemic fluorides are needed in nonfluoridated areas is an outdated one that should be abandoned altogether," says Canada's leading fluoride authority, Hardy Limeback, head of the Department of Preventive Dentistry at the University of Toronto and past president of the Canadian Association for Dental Research. “Fluoride gets into every cell of the body and can especially damage the bones and teeth." says Limeback.
END
References:
(1)http://cbc.ca/cgi-bin/templates/view.cgi?category=Sci-Tech&story=/news/1998/12/29/fluoride981229
(2)http://www.citizens.org/Food_water_safety/Fluoridation/Materials/web_pages/letter%20_%20to_FDA.htm
and
Crystal Wyand, spokesperson, FDA's Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, e-mail correspondence.
(3) http://consensus.nih.gov/news/releases/115_release.htm
and British Medical Journal (B.M.J.), October 7, 2000,McDonagh, et al
(4) "The Metabolism and Toxicity of Fluoride," by Gary Whitford
(5) Journal of the California Dental Association, January 1997, “The Fluoride Victory,” by Joanne Boyd
(6) Journal of the American Dental Association, February 2002
(7)http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/news/archive/2002/03/08/financial1058EST0079.DTL
(8)http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=10682335&dopt=Abstract
Sally Stride
http://www.fluoridedangers.blogspot.com
Wednesday, April 12, 2006
CDC recommendations Part 2
ME: So are you asking formula and baby foods also be fluoride labeled?
CDC: silence
ME: So, if ingested fluoride doesn’t reduce tooth decay and if saliva fluoride levels aren’t high enough to prevent tooth decay, what good is fluoridation?
CDC: “ drinking fluoridated water, brushing with fluoride toothpaste, or using other fluoride dental products can raise the concentration of fluoride in saliva present in the mouth 100- to 1,000-fold.”
ME: When I do the math this works out to 0.6 ppm to 6 ppm in non-fluoridated communities and 1.6 - 16 ppm in fluoridated communities. Isn’t that high enough to cause fluorosis since all fluorides get absorbed into the bloodstream via the mucous membranes of the mouth and some fluoridated dental products get swallowed inadvertently.
CDC: The concentration returns to previous levels within 1--2 hours but, during this time, saliva serves as an important source of fluoride for concentration in plaque and for tooth remineralization.
ME: Assuming you haven’t brushed away the plaque. But you didn’t answer my fluorosis question.
CDC: “Some persons choose to modify this condition with elective cosmetic treatment”
ME: Is this cost factored into the cost/benefit of water fluoridation?
CDC: “most persons would be classified as low risk (for cavities) at any given time.”
ME: There you go again changing the subject. So, if the dentist isn’t sure, he/she treats my child as a low risk cavity person.
CDC: “when classification is uncertain, treating a person as high risk is prudent until further information or experience allows a more accurate assessment. This assumption increases the immediate cost of caries prevention or treatment and might increase the risk for enamel fluorosis for children aged <6 years...”
ME: So you’d rather make more money and give my kid fluorosed teeth than give less fluoride which you say doesn’t work inside the teeth or outside a clean tooth. To tell you the truth I’m doubting the necessity of fluoride at all, doc. What else should I know?
CDC: “Adherence to the recommendations in this report regarding appropriate use of fluoride for children aged <6 years will reduce the prevalence and severity of enamel fluorosis”
ME: Why, is there a problem?
CDC: “The U.S. Publc Health Service (PHS) developed recommendations in the 1940s and 1950s regarding fluoride concentrations in public water supplies. At that time, public
health officials assumed that drinking water would be the major source of fluoride for most U.S. residents.”
ME: Assumed?
CDC: “...fluoride-containing products, including toothpaste (i.e., dentifrice), mouthrinse, dietary supplements, and professionally applied or prescribed gel, foam, or varnish. In addition, processed beverages, which constitute an increasing proportion of the diets of many U.S. residents and food can contain small amounts of fluoride, especially if they are processed with fluoridated water. Thus, U.S. residents have more sources of fluoride available now than 50 years ago.
ME: You forgot fluoride in medicines, inhaled and absorbed fluoride from ocean mist, fluoridated shower and bath water and cold mist humidifiers as well as fluoride air pollution from industry emissions, coal burning, electric plants, and even volcanoes. OK, so I know a little about fluoride.
CDC: “...The United States does not have comprehensive recommendations for caries prevention and control through various combinations of fluoride modalities. Adoption of such recommendations could...(reduce) the prevalence of enamel fluorosis...”
ME: What do I do in the meantime?
CDC: “...attention to fluoride intake among children aged <6 years to decrease the risk for enamel fluorosis.”
ME: I understand that dentists are taught to prescribe fluoride supplements for all children over 6 months who live in non-fluoridated or low fluoride communities.
CDC: “Fluoride supplements can be prescribed for children at high risk for dental caries and whose primary drinking water has a low fluoride concentration.”
ME: Oh so it’s only for children at high risk of cavities.
CDC: “For children aged <6 years, the dentist, physician, or other health-care provider should weigh the risk for caries without fluoride supplements, the caries prevention offered by supplements, and the potential for enamel fluorosis.”
ME: Why is that?
CDC: “A few studies have reported no association between supplement use by children aged <6 years and enamel fluorosis but most have reported a clear association.”
ME: So, no supplements for my 5 year old. But do supplements reduce tooth decay?
CDC: “The evidence for using fluoride supplements to mitigate dental caries is mixed.”
ME: Even this, you are not sure of?
CDC: “fluoride supplements also could increase the risk for enamel fluorosis at this age” (6 and under)…”
ME: What about all that science you said you had to support their use?
CDC: “Many studies of the effectiveness of fluoride supplements in preventing dental caries among children aged <6 years have been flawed in design and conduct.”
ME: Oh, so fluoride supplements are more likely to cause fluorosis than decrease tooth decay in the under six year old group. So now your supplement and fluoridation studies are flawed. I guess those anti-fluoridationists were right all along. What else?
CDC: “Consideration of the child's other sources of fluoride, especially drinking water, is essential in determining this balance. Parents and caregivers should be informed of both the benefit of protection against dental caries and the possibility of enamel fluorosis.”
ME: No dentist ever told me the risks of fluoride. So that’s a good one. What else.
CDC: “Parents and caregivers should consult a dentist or other health-care provider before introducing a child aged <2 years to fluoride toothpaste.”
ME: How about fluoride treatments at the dentist
CDC: “Whether fluoride varnish or gel would be most efficiently used in clinical programs targeting groups at high risk for dental caries or should be reserved for individual patients at high risk is unclear.”
ME: What about low risk people?
CDC: “Routine use of professionally applied fluoride gel or foam likely provides little benefit to persons not at high risk for dental caries, especially those who drink fluoridated water and brush daily with fluoride toothpaste.”
ME: Oy. What else?
CDC “Parents and caregivers should not provide additional fluoride to children aged <6 years without consulting a dentist or other health-care provider regarding the associated benefits and potential for enamel fluorosis.”
ME: Sounds reasonable to me; I just hope my dentist knows all this stuff. They say many doctors get their medical information from the media. The media told us 100 million Americans are deprived of fluoride but that’s not what you are telling me.
ME: What’s up with these school fluoridation programs?
CDC: “ a fluoride concentration of 4.5 times the optimal concentration … to compensate for the more limited consumption of fluoridated water. At the peak of this practice in the early 1980s, a total of 13 states had initiated school water fluoridation in 470 schools serving 170,000 children
ME: How many now?
CDC: “... the current extent of this practice is not known.
ME: I think that’s something you should know.
ME: What about fluoride mouthrinses.
CDC: “The National Preventive Dentistry Demonstration Program (NPDDP), a large project conducted in 10 U.S. cities during 1976-1981 to compare the cost and effective-ness of combinations of caries-prevention procedures, reported that fluoride mouthrinse had little effect among schoolchildren, either among first-grade students with high and low caries experience or among all second- and fifth-grade students”
ME: Why am I not surprised. What about school fluoride mouthrinse programs?
CDC: Throughout the 1980s, approximately 3 million children in the United States participated in school-based fluoride mouthrinsing programs
ME: What about now?
CDC: “The current extent of such programs is not known.”
ME: Again, you don’t know? What do you know.
CDC: “Use of fluoride supplements by pregnant women does not benefit their offspring”
ME: You crafty little devils conveniently left unmentioned that the fluorides used to fluoridate drinking water are mostly silicofluorides, waste products of the fertilizer industry, contaminated with arsenic, lead, and more, which have never been safety tested in humans or animals according to the EPA. (See http://www.dartmouth.edu/~rmasters/letter.jpg)
THE END
The actual CDC from which this is dervied can be found here:
http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/rr5014a1.htm
Saturday, March 18, 2006
Look Ma - More Cavities
In February of 1972 the ADA reported that, in fluoridated cities, dentists reaped a net profit 17% higher than in nonfluoridated cities.
In fact, in their zeal to promote fluoridation as their gift to the poor, and maybe help sell more Crest, someone forgot to check tooth decay statistics against fluoridation rates. Organized dentistry actually awarded the most toothless and cavity-prone states and cities in the name of water fluoridation in 2004. (1a)
Lots of evidence shows tooth decay crises in fluoridated cities and states: (1b)
The ongoing Iowa Fluoride Study reports in March 2006 that children in fluoridated communities have more fluorosis, but no less tooth decay, than children who live in sub-optimally fluoridated areas.(9)
A 1992 University of Arizona study found that "the more fluoride a child drinks, the more cavities appear in the teeth."
After 50 years of water fluoridation, Newburgh, New York, children have more cavities than kids from never-fluoridated Kingston, New York.(2)
After Kentucky required fluoride chemicals be dispensed into drinking water to reduce cavities, tooth decay rates almost doubled in pre-school children.(3)
A majority of Asian-American children living in areas with fluoridated water suffer with the highest prevalence and the greatest amount of cavities, according to a California study.(4)
In fact, many studies show that when fluoridation ceases, cavity rates go down.(5)
African children from Uganda, enjoy fewer cavities than American children even though fluoridated toothpaste and toothbrushes are virtually unknown to them. However, Ugandan children who drink high fluoride water have more tooth decay than their equals in low fluoride districts.(6)
Based on thirty years of study on .4 million children, Teotia and Teotia report "Our findings indicate that dental caries is caused by high fluoride and low dietary calcium intakes, separately and through their interactions." (6a)
Ireland, 73% fluoridated since the 1960’s, has a higher tooth decay rate than five other European countries that don’t add fluoride chemicals into the water, according to the June 30, 2001, Irish Independent.
Consistent with previous findings, Wondwossen and colleagues found a positive association between water fluoride levels and cavities. (7)
Tooth decay declined substantially in prevalence and severity when Hong Kong children consumed less fluoride, indicative of a world-wide scientific trend revealing, with fluoride, less is best; none is better.(7a)
Dentists once predicted that fluoridation would put them out of business. Instead, after 60 years of water fluoridation and 50 years of fluoridated toothpaste, dentists make much more money than physicians while working less hours, less days and with less responsibility. (7b)
References:
(1) http://64.177.90.157/pfpc/html/bibby_radike.html
(1a) http://www.orgsites.com/ny/newyorkstatecoalitionopposedtofluoridation/_pgg1.php3
(1b) http://www.orgsites.com/ny/nyscof2/_pgg6.php3
(2) http://www.orgsites.com/ny/nyscof/_pgg2.php3
(3) http://www.orgsites.com/ny/newyorkstatecoalitionopposedtofluoridation/_pgg3.php3
(4) "The Association of Early Childhood Caries and Race/Ethnicity among California Preschool Children, by Shiboski, Gansky, Ramos-Gomez, Ngo, Isman, Pollick, Journal of Public Health Dentistry, Winter 2003, pages 38-46 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=12597584
(5) http://www.fluoridealert.org/health/teeth/caries/fluoridation.html#cessation
(6a) Teotia SPS, Teotia M. (1994). Dental Caries: A Disorder of High Fluoride and Low Dietary Calcium Interactions (30 Years of Personal Experience. Fluoride 27: 59-66.
(7) 1) Community Dent Oral Epidemiol. 2004 Oct, “The relationship between dental caries and dental fluorosis in areas with moderate- and high-fluoride drinking water in Ethiopia,” by Wondwossen F, Astrom AN, Bjorvatn K, Bardsen A.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=15341618
(7a) http://www.enn.com/press.html?id=97
(7b) http://www.wsjclassroomedition.com/archive/05apr/care_dentist.htm
(8)http://www.ada.org/prof/resources/pubs/adanews/adanewsarticle.asp?articleid=1350
(9) AADR 35th Annual Meeting in Orlando:
Abstract # 0153 - Dental caries and fluorosis in relation to water fluoride levels, I Hong, SM Levy, J Warren, B Broffitt http://snipurl.com/n8hg
Return to Fluoride Dangers Home: http://www.fluoridedangers.blogspot.com
Saturday, January 14, 2006
Human Experiment Predicts Fluoride Dangers
Brown and yellow discolored, but decay resistant, teeth are prevalent in populations drinking and irrigating their crops with naturally calcium-fluoridated water. Public health officials wondered if sodium fluoride injected in small doses into “fluoride-deficient” water supplies, then ingested by children and incorporated into their developing teeth, would prevent cavities without endangering their health or mottling their teeth, now called dental fluorosis.
So, ten years ago Newburgh’s faucets began spouting 1.2 parts per million (ppm) sodium fluoride. Nearby Kingston, New York, the control city for comparison purposes, was left fluoride-free. Kingston and Newburgh are thirty-five miles apart on the Hudson River and have 1940 populations of 31,956 and 28,817, respectively. In Newburgh, 500 children were examined after ten years and 405 in Kingston. Adults were never tested.
Due to political pressure, the Newburgh/Kingston study was declared a success five years ago before these ill health effects were found. As a result, many U.S. cities started fluoridation believing it is safe and effective.
Sodium fluoride ingestion is not approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and is on the market as a rat poison. Once any drug is on the market for any reason, doctors are allowed to prescribe it for other diseases. Hence, many physicians and dentists are “off-labeling” sodium fluoride as a cavity preventive for children who don’t drink fluoridated water supplies, of course, in much smaller doses than needed to kill rats.
Newburgh's children were given complete physicals and x-rays, over the course of the study, from birth to age nine in the first year and up to age eighteen in the final year. “(R)outine laboratory studies were omitted in the control group during most of the study, they were included in the final examination,” according to Schlesinger and colleagues, in “Newburgh-Kingston caries-fluorine study XIII. Pediatric findings after ten years.”
The researchers also report:
“The average age at the menarche was 12 years among the girls studied in Newburgh and 12 years 5 months among the girls in Kingston.”
Hemoglobin (iron-containing part of a red blood cell): “a few more children in the range below 12.9 grams per hundred milliliters in Newburgh”
“…a slightly higher proportion of children in Newburgh were found to have a total erythrocyte (red blood cell) count below 4,400,000 per milliliter”
Knee X-rays of Newburgh children reveals more cortical bone defects, and irregular mineralization of the thigh bone.
Only twenty-five Newburgh children had eye and ear exams. Two have apparent hearing loss. Eight have abnormal vision. Even though researchers discovered more adult cataracts in surveys conducted before 1944 in communities with naturally high water fluoride concentrations (1)Newburg and Kingston adults were never checked for this defect.
Only two groups of twelve-year-old boys were tested for fluoride’s toxic kidney effects.
--------------------------------------------------
The above is a report of the 1956 Newburgh/Kingston fluoridation study as it should have been reported.
It’s the reference that’s still used today to substantiate claims that fluoridation is safe for everyone. No other comprehensive health study of water fluoridation has ever been conducted to the best of my knowledge.
The 2004 book "The Fluoride Deception," by Christopher Bryson, reveals that in addition to NYS Dep't of Health examinations “the University of Rochester conducted its own studies, measuring how much fluoride Newburgh citizens retained in their blood and tissues. Health Department personnel cooperated, shipping blood and placenta samples to the Rochester scientists,” writes Bryson. Three times as much fluoride was found in the placentas and blood samples gathered from Newburgh as from non-fluoridated Rochester, reports Bryson.
Following back the scientific references in all current fluoridation safety literature will invariably lead back to the Newburgh/Kingston study which actually failed to prove fluoridation is safe for all who drink it.
After sixty years of fluoridation fed to over 2/3 of Americans, the U.S. Surgeon General reports, tooth decay is a silent epidemic.
However, dental fluorosis is occuring across the land instead of just in isolated communities, affecting upwards of 42% of American schoolchildren, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control.
Reference:
(1) Fluoridation researcher, Peter Meiers, has more information about the Newburgh/Kingston study on his website:
http://pmeiers.bei.t-online.de/bartlett.htm
Newburgh-Kingston caries-fluorine study. XIII. Pediatric findings after ten years.
J Am Dent Assoc. 1956 Mar;52(3):296-306. SCHLESINGER ER, OVERTON DE, CHASE HC, CANTWELL KT.
Thursday, January 05, 2006
Fluoride Harmful
Fluoride’s harmful health effects, except to teeth, are rarely studied in the U.S. and, in fact, are often discouraged(b).
In areas of India, where food and water are naturally fluoride-abundant, severe fluoride toxicity is common and manifests as debilitating and disfiguring diseases(d). Well-known is that fluoride excess irreversibly cripples bones and crumbles teeth (skeletal and dental fluorosis, respectively).
Lesser-known is that early fluorosis warning signs, or soft tissue toxicity, are reversible with a diet adequate in calcium, vitamins C, E, other antioxidants and withdrawal of all fluoride sources (the intervention), report researchers Madhu Bhatnager and Professor (Dr.) A.K. Susheela, the CEO and Director of India’s Fluorosis Research and Rural Development Foundation.
“It is now an established fact that fluoride ingestion over a period of time can affect the structure and function of cells, tissues, organs and systems resulting in a variety of clinical manifestations," writes Dr. Susheela who researches fluoride extensively . The following symptoms can occur even from fluoride consumption at the low level added to most US water supplies.
1) aches and pain in the joints, i.e. neck, back, hip, shoulder and knee without visible signs of fluid accumulation
2) non-ulcer dyspepsia such as nausea, vomiting, pain in the stomach, bloated feeling or gas formation in the stomach, constipation followed by diarrhea
3) polyuria (frequent urination) and polydipsia (excessive thirst)
4) muscle weakness, fatigue, anemia with low hemoglobin level
5) complaints of repeated abortions/still birth
6) complaints of male infertility with abnormality in sperm morphology, oligospermia (spermatozoa deficiency in the semen), azoospermia (spermatozoa absence in the semen) and low testosterone levels.”
Susheela and Bhatnager recommend physicians consider fluoride toxicity for the above-listed patient complaints and/or any loss of shine or discoloration in the patient’s front row of teeth, which may be due to dental fluorosis.
“Pediatricians need to be educated about fluorosis. Perhaps water fluoridation and indiscriminate promotion of fluoridated dental products in the name of prevention of dental caries (cavities) need to be reviewed,” writes Susheela and Bhatnager
U.S. studies show American children are fluoride saturated, ruining their teeth with dental fluorosis; yet cavity rates are rising (1-8). These children should be studied for fluoride’s other adverse health effects and correlated to essential nutrient consumption and cavities.
Also never studied, incredibly, are the most widely-used artificial fluoride chemicals Americans drink daily - silicofluorides (j), derived from fertilizers, purposely added to water supplies, at about 1 milligram fluoride per quart of water, in an attempt to reduce tooth decay. Recent published studies indicate that children who live in silico-fluoridated communities have higher blood lead levels than children who live in sodium fluoridated or non-fluoridated communities (k).
Ironically, higher blood lead levels are also linked to higher rates of tooth decay (L) and are associated with higher rates of diseases and behavioral problems (including hyperactivity, substance abuse, and violent crime).
Fluoride is neither a nutrient nor essential to health. Fluoride deficiency does not lead to tooth decay. Poor diet causes cavities and fluoride can’t fix a poor diet.
Fluoride has been linked to many other health problems such as thyroid dysfunction, bone fractures, lowered IQ, allergic and intolerant effects and more.
(a) http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=12162452&dopt=Abstract
(b) http://www.fluoridealert.org/mullenix.htm
(d) http://www.fluoridealert.org/fluorosis-india.htm
(e) September, 2001, Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, “Fluoride Content of Foods Made with Mechanically Separated Chicken,” by Fein and Cerklewski http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=11559124&dopt=Abstract
(f) http://bruha.com/fluoride/html/f-_in_food.html
(g) ASCD J Dent Child 2001 Jan-Feb, “Fluoride content of infant formulas prepared with deionized, bottled mineral and fluoridated drinking water http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=11324405&dopt=Abstract
(h)Community Dent Oral Epidemiol 2002 Aug, "Primary tooth fluorosis and fluoride intake during the first year of life," Levy SM, et al http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=12147170&dopt=Abstract
(i) March 1999 Journal of the American Dental Association “Fluorosis of the primary dentition: what does it mean for permanent teeth?” by Warren JJ, Kanellis MJ, Levy SM http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=10085657&dopt=Abstract
(j)http://ntp-server.niehs.nih.gov/htdocs/Chem_Background/ExSumPDF/Fluorosilicates.pdf
(k) http://www.fluoridealert.org/sf-masters.htm
(L) http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=12361944&dopt=Abstract
(1) “Are Cavity Rates Rising,” Delta Dental
http://www.deltanj.com/kids_club/news_wisdom_1002.shtml#6
(2) NBC Arkansas News Report
http://www.arkansasnbc.com/weeklys/parenting/apr02/index.shtml
“Are the amount of cavities rising in children?”
(3) University of Rochester News Release “Dental cavities on the rise again;
back to 'drill and fill'“
http://fluoride.oralhealth.org/papers/2000/eurekaalert040800.htm
(4) “Rise in tooth decay may be tied to sugary pop, sports drinks and even
bottled water,” Seattle Times
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/healthscience/134458074_cavity21.html
(5) “Early Childhood Tooth Decay,” by Stephen R. Branam, D.D.S
http://www.drbranam.com/pgeArticle_Early.htm
(6) “Special Report: Cincinnati's dental crisis,”
http://enquirer.com/editions/2002/10/06/loc_special_report.html
(7) The Wall Street Journal, “Health Journal: As kids' cavities rise, some
dentists advocate using tooth sealants,” Tara Parker-Pope, March 8, 2002
(8) “Dentists Show Fluoridation a Failure,”
http://www.healthsentinel.com/News/Flouride.htm
Return to Fluoride Dangers Home:
http://www.FluorideDangers.blogspot.com
Wednesday, January 04, 2006
The Politics of Fluoridation
In a presentation made at the February 2001 Annual Meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Groth reported that, with three experimental fluoridation trials incomplete, enthusiastic fluoridation proponents successfully lobbied and persuaded the U.S. Public Health Service (PHS) to endorse fluoridation in 1950 who, then with a few state dental officials, began vigorously promoting fluoridation with little, if any, scientific support.
According to Groth, whose 1973 Stanford University doctoral dissertation partially evaluated the use of scientific information in fluoridation policy-making. “There were no significant studies examining the long-term health of people in communities with naturally fluoridated water. .. (However,) exposure via drinking water, at levels not much higher than what was proposed for fluoridation, had been associated in numerous published studies, beginning around 1940, with serious adverse skeletal and neuromuscular effects, in India and other countries. Opposition to fluoridation initially came from scientists concerned about the lack of good evidence on possible health risks,” writes Groth
In order to get fluoridation passed, proponents often belittled opponents and used slick public relations schemes, while refusing to debate the issue, to get fluoridation accepted, reports Groth. Something they still do today
Said Groth, “Those who did openly oppose fluoridation were often subject of personal attack and professional reprisals. For decades, mainstream scientific journals would reject for publication any paper that did not articulate a strictly pro-fluoridation position on risk and benefit questions.”
“I myself had three manuscripts based on my doctoral dissertation rejected by U.S. public health journals in the 1970s,” says Groth. “My reviews of the evidence on risks and benefits of fluoridation were sent to anonymous pro-fluoridation referees, who found them “biased.” One editor advised that he wished to do nothing that might offer anti-fluoridationists any political leverage...(However,) I was politically outside the fray; my interest was exploring the interplay between political controversy and interpretations of scientific data. My papers were still rejected by several leading American journals in the 1970s, I believe because of a pervasive bias in favor of defending and promoting fluoridation,” writes Groth.
Groth reports of the early days of fluoridation, “ Leading PHS dental researchers lobbied every leading scientific organization, to gain endorsements of fluoridation. They cast fluoridation as a product of scientific progress under siege from anti-scientific forces, and rallied the scientific community in political support of the measure. They carried out a few studies looking for possible adverse effects of fluoridation; the studies were poorly designed and inconclusive, by today’s standards, but they found no convincing evidence of harm. The PHS declared the issues closed, the debate over. The studies were roundly criticized as inadequate and biased by leading opponents of the day but fluoridation advocates rapidly took the stance that there was no longer any scientific doubt that fluoridation was safe and effective. Their political strategy was simply to steamroll the opposition, to insist that opponents had no basis for any valid objections. They focused on political campaigning, not on research; in fact, research all but halted, as it was politically inexpedient for the PHS to be studying questions they had already declared adequately answered.”
Times haven’t changed much from the early days of fluoridation as Groth reports it. Dentists still denigrate the opposition, fund huge billboards, radio and TV spots, newspaper ads, and brochures to influence Americans to vote for fluoridation. Organized dentistry often uses their clout to censor fluoridation opponent information from reaching the media, even when it is accurate, while refusing to publicly debate the issue knowing the media likes a controversy and mostly ignores opponents otherwise.
At the same time, some dentists admit the benefits vs. the risks of fluoridation is a legitimate scientific controversy. Fluoridation may be immoral and outdated argues David Locker, BDS, PhD, professor and director of the Community Dental Health Services Research Unit, Faculty of Dentistry, University of Toronto in the November 2001, Journal of the Canadian Dental Association (http://www.cda-adc.ca/jcda/vol-67/issue-10/eng/578.html ).
And in a new devious twist, the American Dental Association, acting like teenage hackers, bought the domain name “www.fluoridealert.com” and “www.fluoridealert.net” to deceive web surfers away from fluoridation opponents’ website, http://www.fluoridealert.org , the website of the Fluoride Action Network, an international coalition of organizations opposed to fluoridation. Instead, with a slip of a “dot com,” unsuspecting web surfers are tricked to the American Dental Association’s pro-fluoridation information.
Why would dentists do such a thing? Dentistry was a maligned profession before fluoridation gave it respectability. And fluoridation birthed the National Institutes of Dental Research. Fluoridation gives organized dentistry political power as well as millions of federal tax dollars to study fluoride’s effects in humans. Many dentists are stuck in their old-time beliefs and haven’t actually read the literature themselves. Those that do often switch sides.
“Fluoridation campaigns provide a unique opportunity for dentistry to help reduce the incidence of dental disease while establishing political viability...,” according to the Journal of the American Dental Association, “Fluoridation Election Victory: A Case Study for Dentistry in Effective Political Action,” April 1981.
Also, there’s an interesting “marriage” between organized dentistry and fluoride manufacturers who fund dental journals, dental schools, research, awards, symposiums and dental meetings, buy equipment, and do much more for dentists and their organizations.
Dentists censor negative fluoride information whenever they are able to. They discourage newspapers from using fluoridation opponent letters (See http://www.mtn.org/~newscncl/determinations/det_24.html ), encourage internet news services to shut-off fluoridation opponents information (See Fluoridation and Censorship:
http://www.chirojournal.com/newsletter.php?nl=136896&ar=3128 ) while ignoring the misinformation disseminated by their own profession about fluoride and fluoridation on the internet and elsewhere.
A 1999 dental textbook, “Dentist, Dental Practice, and the Community,” by prominent researchers and dental university professors, Burt and Eklund, reports that Groth’s assessment is correct even today - that fluoridation is based more on unproved theories than scientific evidence.
END
Groth’s entire presentation can be found here: http://www.consumersunion.org/food/debate/bio1.htm
page one is at http://www.consumersunion.org/food/debate/bio.htm
Friday, December 30, 2005
Fluoridation Fails New York State
Jonathan Kozol explains life in the 100% fluoridated South Bronx (a NYC borough) in his book, Savage Inequalities, “Bleeding gums, impacted teeth and rotting teeth are routine matters for children..... Children live for months with pain that grown-ups would find unendurable. …I have seen children with teeth that look like brownish, broken sticks. I have seen teenagers who were missing half their teeth....”
Almost three fourths of New Yorkers have consumed tap water injected with fluoride for decades. Yet, New York State’s fluoridated counties and cities suffer worse dental health than those without fluoride-laced water supplies.
America’s oral health crisis is not due to lack of fluoride but because poor people can’t get dentists to fix their teeth. In fact, the American Dental Association says, “Low income is the single best predictor of high caries experience in children,” not lack of fluoridation. Low-income populations have the highest levels of dental disease but are least likely to be cared for, according to the General Accounting Office (1).
Despite fluoridation, severe tooth decay is responsible for two thirds of hospital visits by children under six in New York State (2). In New York City, fluoridated since 1965, more children required cavity-related hospitalizations, proportionately, than two of New York State's largest non-fluoridated counties, Suffolk and Nassau (Long island) whether payment was made by Medicaid or privately.(2)
One New York City hospital charged from $900 to $12,000 to treat 96 children with severely decayed teeth, excluding the dentist and anesthesiologist fees. Children needed extensive work including stainless steel crowns, extractions, root canal therapy, fillings, other restorations, periodontal procedures, surgeries and/or more. (2)
NYS hospital costs were between $2.5 and $33 million for the 2,726 childhood cavities-related surgical visits required by children under six, in 1999. (2) Even after hospital treatment, these children return with new lesions.
According to Dr. Jayanth Kumar, Director, Bureau of Dental Health, NYS Department of Health, Tooth decay "is more of a problem in poor children...We have data for New York State where it shows about 32% of poor children actually have oral health problems compared to only about 12% of non‐poor children. So what has happened over the years is tooth decay
was a problem of the rich in the last century and shifted to poor children around 1970s or so, mainly
because of access to refined sugar and processed foods."
According to Dr. Melinda Clark, "dental exams of preschoolers and early Head Starts in New York State reveal that 40% of children have already had dental disease. And 70% of that 41% have untreated dental decay."
Further evidence shows fluoridation neither saves NYS money nor reduces cavities:
. A 2001 study revealed that in northern Manhattan (New York City), 34% of predominantly black and Hispanic low-income pre-schoolers had rampant tooth decay, with a staggering 6.4 decayed surfaces cavities per affected child.
• According to New York University’s School of Dentistry, "The need for dental care is especially acute among impoverished (NYC) children, who have 60 percent more untreated cavities than their peers at higher socioeconomic levels." (4)
• Lack of oral health care for adults in Harlem is a hidden crisis, write researchers in the American Journal of Public Health. (5)
• "Adolescents in northern Manhattan (another NYC borough) have higher caries prevalence than their national counterparts,” The Journal of Public Health Dentistry, reports." (6)
• Latinos and African American seniors suffer high rates of tooth decay and tooth loss in Northern Manhattan (7), according to the Journal of Community Health.
• A higher prevalence of dental decay is found in New York City African Americans, aged 18 - 64, than found nationally, reports Dental Clinics of North America. (8)
• Dental caries, among disadvantaged 3 to 4-year-old children in northern Manhattan, are higher than the national average (9), according to Pediatric Dentistry.
• After over fifty years of water fluoridation, many children in Newburgh, New York have more cavities and more fluoride--caused discolored teeth (dental fluorosis) than children in never-fluoridated Kingston, New York, according to a New York State Department of Health study published in the New York State Dental Journal (10).
• Second-graders from non-fluoridated Long Island, New York, are more cavity-free than second graders nationally (11) where two thirds of Americans drink fluoridated public water supplies.
• Despite a tremendous effort to improve oral health in fluoridated Rochester and Monroe County, lack of dental care has created a tooth decay crisis.(12)
• In fluoridated Syracuse and Massena, many children are raised in homes where they feel it's their destiny to have tooth decay and tooth pain.(13)
• "Poor oral health was identified as the number one complaint in a population-based survey of Central Harlem conducted in 1992-1994." (14)
• In Harlem, N.Y., forty-six percent of African-American seniors were missing teeth, compared with twenty-two percent of Latinos. (15)
• "The state also has increased dental payment rates by 250 percent over the past few years, with little success in improving access to dental care." in fluoridated Syracuse, New York.(16)
• Cavities are rising in fluoridated Rochester’s 10-year-old population. (17)
• Eighteen percent of older New Yorkers lost six or more teeth due to dental disease, (18) while only sixteen percent of non-fluoridated Long islanders did. (19)
• Similarly twenty-one percent of Brooklyn’s and twenty percent of Queens’ residents have less teeth (20), than non-fluoridated Suffolk and Nassau Counties.
• Cavity crises occur in many fluoridated cities and states. (21)
By neglecting the poor, organized dentistry helped create an oral health epidemic (22). Promoting fluoridation may deflect government regulators from forcing dentists to actually treat poor children (23).
Besides, after six decades of water fluoridation, cavity rates have increased recently in America’s 2 to 4 year-old population who should be the most “fluoride-protected.” (23a)
And, according to the American Dental Association News, average net income of a full time independent non-solo pediatric dentist was $336,860 in 2001, up more than twenty-five percent since 1998. Since eighty percent of all decay occurs mostly in the dentist-abandoned poor, some public health dentists ask, what kinds of necessary dental services are provided to higher socio-economic kids to generate a net income of $336,860 annually?
In 1984, NYC spent $2.4 million for fluoridation chemicals, equipment and manpower, according to the NYC Department of Environmental Protection. In 2003, fluoride chemicals, alone, cost NYC $6 million, according to the New York Sun.
Fluoridation money, literally flushed down the toilet, should be earmarked to treat poor NYC children’s dental pain immediately.
Even more worrying is that higher blood lead levels are found in New York State (and other) children whose water supplies contain the fluoride chemicals, silicofluorides, when compared to non-fluoridated or sodium fluoridated communities, reports Masters and Coplan and substantiated by CDC scientists.(24) Ironically, higher blood lead levels are linked to more cavities. (25)
The cost of fluoridation isn’t the only price we pay when silicofluorides are put into drinking water. “Silicofluorides have very costly side-effects,” says Roger Masters, PhD, co-author of the silicofluoride/lead studies. “Lead lowers IQ and influences behavior in many ways. Epidemiology shows that where silicofluorides are used, there are higher rates of learning disabilities, substance abuse, and violent crime. Our studies do not find similar effects for sodium fluoride,” says Masters.
“The result is that silicofluoride usage has the effect of increasing public expenses and taxes,” says Masters. For example costs of jailing criminals, adversely affected by silicofluorides and special education classes for children with lower IQ due to high-blood-lead levels could be diminished if the offending silicofluorides were removed from public water supplies, Masters explains.
"The oral health crisis facing America today shows fluoridation and public health dentistry is failing America’s neediest children. Why is organized dentistry less supportive of a public health approach to improving access to care? Perhaps that’s because Americans spent roughly $64 billion on dental procedures last year with more than half of those procedures being cosmetic—fillings, crowns, implants, and high-end restorative procedures, according to government data," reported in Access, an American Dental Hygienists' Association publication.(26)
Organized dentistry often hinders programs designed to reach out to America's underserved, protecting their monopoly rather than America's neediiest. The ADA publicly invalidates dental hygienists solo practices along with their "Give-Kids-A-Smile" public relations materials. The hygienists lash back with their own news release (27) The ADA also frowns on dental therapists, specially trained hygienists who can fill the cavities dentists refuse to.(28)
References:
(1) September 2000 “Oral Health Factors Contributing to Low Use of Dental
Services by Low-Income Populations,” General Accounting Office
http://www.gao.gov/archive/2000/he00149.pdf
(1a) Colgate Oral Care Report Volume 14 No. 4, November 4, 2004 http://www.colgateprofessional.com/app/cop/repository/article-201/frameset.jsp
(1b) (1b) http://www.orgsites.com/ny/nyscof/_pgg6.php3
(2) "Early Childhood Caries-related Visits to Hospitals for Ambulatory Surgery in New York State," Wadhawan, Kumar, Badner, Green, Journal of Public Health Dentistry Vol 63 No.1, Winter 2003
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=12597585
(3) “Dentists' pay tops doctors' Even with fewer cavities to fill, dentists' earnings are skyrocketing.” By Mark Maremont, The Wall Street Journal, January 11, 2005
http://www.bradenton.com/mld/bradenton/business/10614433.htm
(4) New York University, School of Dentistry, “Speaker Miller and City Council Expand Dental Services for Needy Children” http://www.nyu.edu/dental/news/needychildren.html
(5) “Lack of Oral Health Care for Adults in Harlem: A Hidden Crisis,” Zabos, et al, American Journal of Public Health, January 2002, Vol 92, No.l
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=11772760
(6) Journal of Public Health Dentistry, Summer; 63(3): 189-94
"Dental caries experience in northern Manhattan adolescents.".
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=12962473
(7) Journal of Community Health, August 2003, " Oral disease burden and dental services utilization by Latino and African-American seniors in Northern Manhattan."
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=12856796
(8) Dental Clinics of North America, January 2003 "Dental caries prevalence among a sample of African American adults in New York City,"
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=12519005&dopt=Abstract
(9) Pediatric Dentistry, May-June 2002, "Dental caries among disadvantaged 3- to 4-year-old children in northern Manhattan"
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=12064497
(10) NYS Dental Journal,"Recommendations for Fluoride Use in children," February 1998 by dentists Kumar and Green. Figure 1, Page 41, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=9542393
(11) Page four of ERIE COUNTY HEALTH DEPARTMENT COMMUNITY HEALTH ASSESSMENT - FAMILY HEALTH
http://wings.buffalo.edu/wny/health/den.pdf
(12) Democrat and Chronicle, "Dental care is luxury for many locals," October 2004
http://www.democratandchronicle.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20041002/NEWS01/410020317/1002/NEWS
(13) Small Smiles gives kids a reason to grin
Updated: 12/1/2004 by Al Nall, News 10 Now Web Staff
http://news10now.com/content/all_news/?ArID=32340&SecID=83
(14)
Abstract presented at meeting of American Public Health Association
“Community DentCare Network: Community-academic partnerships as a model in identifying, addressing, and reducing oral health disparities”
http://apha.confex.com/apha/132am/techprogram/paper_85424.htm
(15) U.S. News and World Reports 11/9/04
Open wide
A report looks at the dental health of African-American males,
By Elizabeth Querna
http://www.usnews.com/usnews/health/briefs/oral/hb041109b.htm?track=rss
(16) Cost Concerns Grow Despite New Health Plan Competition in Syracuse
Community Report No. 7
Summer 2003
http://www.hschange.org/CONTENT/572/
(17) University of Rochester News Release
Dental cavities on the rise again; back to 'drill and fill'
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2000-04/UoR-Dcot-0704100.php
(18) U.S. Centers for Disease Control statistics: http://apps.nccd.cdc.gov/brfss/display.asp?cat=OH&yr=2002&qkey=6605&state=NY
(19) http://apps.nccd.cdc.gov/brfss-smart/MMSARiskChart.asp?yr=2002&MMSA=83&cat=OH&qkey=6605&grp=0
(20) http://apps.nccd.cdc.gov/brfss-smart/MMSACtyRiskChart.asp?MMSA=61&yr2=2002&qkey=6605&CtyCode=91&cat=OH#OH
(21) Cavity Crises in Fluoridated Cities and States compiled by New York State Coalition Opposed to Fluoridation http://www.orgsites.com/ny/nyscof2/_pgg6.php3
(22) “FIRST-EVER SURGEON GENERAL'S REPORT ON ORAL HEALTH FINDS PROFOUND DISPARITIES IN NATION'S POPULATION,” News Release, May 2000, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
http://www.surgeongeneral.gov/news/pressreleases/pr_oral_52000.htm
(23) Oregon Dental Association newsletter, April 2004, Volume 9, Number 11 (Page 6)
http://www.oregondental.org/oda/section.cfm?wSectionID=1277
(23a)
Data Presentation by Dr. Edward Sondik
Director, National Center for Health Statistics
http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/about/otheract/hpdata2010/focusareas/fa21-oral.htm
(24) More Lead in Children Who Drink Fluoridated Water, by Sally Stride, June 2004
http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/fluoridation/109036
(25) Moss, M.E. 1999. Association of dental caries and blood lead levels. Journal of the American Medical Association 281(June 23/30):2294.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=10386553&dopt=Abstract
(26) "Why Millions Suffer with preventable oral disease," by Bryan L. Scott, June 2002 . Access, an American Dental Hygienist Association’s publication
By Bryant L. Scott
http://www.adha.org/downloads/0506lead.pdf
27) ADHA’s Response to ADA Study: The Economic Impact of Unsupervised Dental Hygiene Practice and its Impact on Access to Care in the State of Colorado , February 4, 2005
http://www.adha.org/news/012805-study.htm
(28) "First Alaskan dental therapists to qualify," RDH
http://de.pennnet.com/Articles/Article_Display.cfm?ARTICLE_ID=219527&p=56
Tuesday, December 27, 2005
Fluoridation Harms Kidney Patient
Then suddenly the pain disappeared and her hospital visits became fewer and farther between. Even the doctors were confounded-–nothing had changed – except the water-–it was no longer fluoridated.
Lail’s water provider, the South Blount Utility District in Tennessee opened a new plant in June 2004 and started providing unfluoridated water.
Lail told this story to Lesli Bales-Sherrod, a reporter for the Daily Times of Maryville, Tennessee (1)
“`I thought it was a fluke or something,’ (Lail) acknowledged. ‘When you’ve been sick like that for so many years, you don’t want to analyze why (your’re doing better). I didn’t want to talk about it; I was afraid it might go away,’” Bales-Sherrod writes.
Lail is willing to show her medical records to the skeptical. But she probably doesn’t know that the literature is littered with warnings that people with pyelonephritis should avoid fluoride.
But, for some reason, otherwise sensible people trust dentists’ opinions on fluoride’s bodily effects-–as if looking into mouths all day can detect kidney problems.
So legislators follow dentists’ advice and put fluoride into their constituents’ water supplies. Media knight dentists as fluoride experts and write positive fluoride stories, not at all shy to belittle their readers opposed to fluoridation-–a script handed to them by the fluoridationists.
Dentists assure anyone who will listen that, when added to drinking water, fluoride, like a miracle drug, prevents tooth decay with absolutely no harmful effects, except maybe some discolored teeth.
Dentists need to get acquainted with Lail and the scientific literature. It’s well known that fluoride harms kidneys and/or people whose kidneys don’t excrete fluoride properly.
“Kidney patients retain as much as 60% more fluoride than do persons in normal health,” writes physician George Waldbott, the leading medical expert on the clinical aspects of chronic fluoride toxicity when he wrote “Fluoridation the Great Dilemma,” published in 1978 with Harvard educated Albert Burgshthler, Phd, university professor and now Editor of the journal, “Fluoride.”
Waldbott describes two of his patients harmed by fluoridated water.
Twenty-seven year old G.L.’s kidney disease was so bad, she was slated to have her left kidney removed. Additionally, she suffered from pain and numbness in her arms and legs, spastic bowels, mouth ulcers, and headaches.
After, following Waldbott’s advice to avoid the fluoridated water, not only did the above symptoms disappear, but her left kidney began to function again. A five year follow-up found her still healthy.
E. P., 39 years old, had advanced pyelitis (another name for pyelonephritis, Janet Lail’s disease) of the left kidney, bone changes and the same clinical picture as G.L.
E.P.’s diseased kidney and other symptoms improved markedly within six weeks after she stopped drinking her artificially fluoridated water supply.
“One of the most striking features in the early stage of fluorosis is the craving for fluids, accompanied by excess production of urine. Indeed, the more water the patient drinks the thirstier he or she becomes,” writes Waldbott.
Dentists rely on outdated and questionable data to absolve fluoride in kidney problems. For instance Hodge and Smith wrote that “no soft tissue stores fluoride.” We now know that Hodge’s main concern in the 1940’s was to downplay fluoride’s bad effects to protect the super-secret Manhattan Project, which produced the first atomic bomb that ended World War II.
Hodge knew that fluoride emissions from Manhattan Project contracters were killing and maiming nearby farm crops and animals. (See “The Fluoride Deception” by Christopher Bryson). But stopping the fluoride emissions could kill the project. So instead they downplayed or ignored fluoride’s ill effects.
In 1991 the U.S. government admitted fluoride’s harm. “...subsets of the population may be unusually susceptible to the toxic effects of fluoride and its compounds. These populations include the elderly, people with magnesium deficiency, and people with cardiovascular and kidney problems,” is reported in, the “Toxicological Profile for Fluorides, Hydrogen Fluoride, and Fluorine,” by the U.S. Department of Health (1991).
It was even known in 1965 that fluoride adversely affects people with Lail’s disease.
"A patient with renal disease (probably chronic pyelonephritis) has been reported whose bone contained fluorine in a concentration exceeding 5,000 ppm. There was no history of exposures to fluorides, and her usual drinking water contained less than 0.5 ppm of fluorine. This is of interest because in a postmortem study in Utah the highest concentrations of fluorine were found in those with chronic pyelonephritis… Sauerbrunn and associates have reported in this issue of the ANNALS the development of skeletal fluorosis in a patient with chronic polydipsia [excessive thirst]; the fluorine content of his drinking water was high but it was not at a level generally associated with the production of skeletal disorder. It seems probable that in this patient and in those with chronic pyelonephritis the high concentrations of fluorine found in the bone are the result of a greater consumption of water, which leads to a greater intake of fluorine,” excerpted from the Annals of Internal Medicine 1963 (1)
Two kidney patients, one with pyelonephritis, were unable to excrete fluoride properly which caused bone damaging skeletal fluorosis, researchers reported in 1972 (2).
In persons with advanced bilateral pyelonephritis, the skeletal fluoride content can be 4-fold that of similarly-exposed persons with normal kidneys, reported Marier in 1977 (2a),
Fluoride interferes with calcium to negatively affect kidneys, a 1999 study shows (3)
"As renal function declines, due either to diseases or with aging, plasma and bone fluoride content both increase," according to the Surgeon General’s 1983 committee notes, reports Chemical & Engineering News (4).
The National Kidney Foundation in its "Position Paper on Fluoridation-1980" also expresses concern about fluoride retention in kidney patients. It cautions doctors "to monitor the fluoride intake of patients with chronic renal impairment, but stops short of recommending the use of fluoride-free drinking water for all patients with kidney disease. It does recommend, however, that dialysis patients use fluoride-free water for their treatments. (4)
Studies show that children with moderately impaired renal function (such as those who have diabetes insipidus), are at some risk of skeletal changes from consumption of fluoridated water, even if the fluoride level is no higher than 1 ppm. A number of researchers have found high concentrations of fluoride in the bones of patients who suffer from kidney disease and have found symptoms of skeletal fluorosis in some of these patients. However, there has been no systematic survey of people with impaired kidney function to determine how many actually suffer a degree of skeletal fluorosis that is clearly detrimental to their health.(4)
Fluoridationists may argue that only approximatrely 1 ppm is injected into water supplies. But did dentists calculate how much hydrogen fluoride South Blount customers breathe in from nearby Alcoa aluminum smokestack air emissions? Did they measure how much fluoride is ingested from dental products, foods and beverages other than water?
I doubt it, they seldom do.
The evidence is in. After 60 years of water fluoridation delivered to 2/3 of Americans via the water supply and 100% of Americans via their food and beverage supply, American children are grossly overfluoridated Yet, tooth decay is a national epidemic.
According to the National Kidney Foundation, more than 20 million Americans - one in nine adults - have chronic kidney disease.
The Pot Calls the Kettle Black
Trust me, dentists say, not those anti-fluoridationists with flawed scientific interpretation, fully aware that tagging us as "anti's" is pejorative in itself.
However, U.S. National Institutes of Health scientists were unable to find any valid science to support fluoride's use in preventing tooth decay.(6) and were "disappointed in the overall quality of the clinical data that it reviewed. According to the panel, far too many studies were small, poorly described, or otherwise methodologically flawed" (over 560 studies evaluated fluoride use), according to a news release issued by the Consensus Development Conference on the Diagnosis and Management of Dental Caries Throughout Life, convened by the National Institutes of Health on March 26-28, 2001 in Bethesda, MD.
British scientists have the same problem
"We were unable to discover any reliable good-quality evidence in the fluoridation literature world-wide...An association with water fluoride and other adverse effects ...was not found. However, we felt that not enough was known because the quality of the evidence was poor," according to a news release issued by Centre for Reviews and Dissemination (CRD), University of York, England. (7) In 1999, the UK Department of Health commissioned CRD to conduct a systematic review into the efficacy and safety of the fluoridation of drinking water.
More studies about fluoride’s ill effect on kidney are here http://www.slweb.org/bibliography.html#kidney
Fluoride toxicity symptoms are listed here: http://www.orgsites.com/ny/nyscof/_pgg1.php3
References:
(1) http://www.slweb.org/adams-jowsey.html
(2) http://www.slweb.org/juncos-1972
(2a) http://www.fluorideaction.org/nrc-fluoride.htm#5.8
(3) http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=PubMed&cmd=Retrieve&list_uids=10356089&dopt=Abstract
(4) http://www.fluoridealert.org/s-fluorosis.htm
(5) http://www.thedailytimes.com/sited/story/html/203214
(6) http://consensus.nih.gov/news/releases/115_release.htm
(7)http://www.york.ac.uk/inst/crd/fluoridnew.htm