WATER FLUORIDATION

by Dr. Lawrence Wilson

© August 2011, the Center for Development

I recently read over a hundred studies on both sides of the water fluoridation issue. Here is a summary of the findings, along with updates. I have also reposted a more recent article by Kelleigh Nelson at the end of this article and a recent posting by Dr. Mercola from the Fluoride Action Network, a very worthwhile association.

UPDATE, AUGUST 12, 2011

A recent medical article documented how fluoridation reduces IQ. This article should be enough to stop fluoridation dead in its tracks. This may be far more important than tooth decay. Here is the link:

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2011/08/12/fluoride-and-the-brain-no-margin-of-safety.aspx?e_cid=20110812_DNL_art_1.

FLUORIDE AND TOOTH DECAY

Tooth decay has indeed decreased around the world. However, fluoride is not the cause. Tooth decay has declined as much or more in non-fluoridated areas as in those with fluoridation. This has been reported in Germany, British Columbia, New Zealand, Cuba, Finland, and the United States. Some small studies show slight benefits of fluoridation. One American study of 39,207 children showed reduced decay of deciduous teeth in 5-year olds in fluoridated areas compared with unfluoridated areas, but no reduction in decay in permanent teeth. The larger studies worldwide show little or no dental benefits of water fluoridation.

The Journal Fluoride, Vol. 27, #1, 13-22, 1994 reported that in a study of 98% of the children in New Zealand over 14 years, fluoridation had no dental benefit on these children. In fact, non-fluoridated communities had slightly less decay. Tooth decay correlated with the level of income and nutrition, not fluoridation.

A study of over 400,000 children in India also showed no benefit of water fluoridation. Studies in England and Scotland found the same result. Dr. Albert Schatz, discoverer of streptomycin, found the same thing in Chile in a study spanning 40 years. A recent study in Tucson, Arizona by Dr. Cornelius Steelink, University of Arizona, showed an increase in decayed, missing or filled teeth with increased fluoride in the drinking water.

As a result of these and other studies, almost all major nations except the US and Britain have stopped fluoridating. 98% of Europe has stopped it. Ireland, one of the few European nations still doing it, is considering discontinuing it. Canada has advised against giving it to children less than 6 years old. India, China and Japan studied it thoroughly and discontinued it.

FLUORIDE SAFETY

Fluorine is a highly toxic element. Proponents say it is a nutrient. Scientists are mixed on this point. If it is a necessary nutrient, only a trace amount is needed in the body. We get this from foods such as tea, and small amounts are found naturally in most drinking water.

Sodium fluoride, the chemical used in water fluoridation, is a cumulative toxin. It is sold as rat poison, used in pesticides, and is the active ingredient in Saran nerve gas. Fluoride tablets require a prescription, unlike any other nutrient mineral. All fluoride toothpaste comes with a warning label. The label states “Keep out of the reach of children under 6. If you swallow more than used for brushing, seek professional assistance or contact a poison control center immediately.” This warning applies to anything greater than a pea-sized drop of toothpaste on your brush.

Fluoride is considered one of the worst, if not the worst airborne pollutant, responsible for decimating fish and wildlife populations. The United States is one of 22 nations that signed a treaty promising not to dump fluorides into the oceans, lakes or rivers.

In the doses that fluoridated water provides, fluoride is associated with higher rates of birth defects, cancer and immunosuppression, lower IQ of children, dental and skeletal fluorosis, and neurological problems. It has also been shown to cause increased bone fractures, cataracts and infant mortality, and some 20 other health effects. A study in Brain Research, vol. 784:1998 showed that fluoride in the water fed to rats increased the absorption of aluminum into the rats brains, causing alterations in the brains similar to Alzheimer’s Disease. Also, fluoride is highly corrosive. Several studies in Massachusetts and elsewhere found higher levels of lead in the drinking water in fluoridated areas. This is most likely due to corrosion of lead pipe joints as a result of the corrosive chemical.

A new study also showed that fluoride accumulates in the pineal gland. This is a hormonal control center and causes severe imbalances in some sensitive people. The work, titled Fluoride Deposition In The Aged Pineal Gland was done as a PhD thesis by Jennifer Luke and published in Caries Research. It can also be found at www.fluoridealert.org.

The fluoride itself isn’t the only problem. The chemical used to fluoridate is not pure. Hydrofluosilicic acid and sodium fluoride are industrial wastes, by-products of the phosphate fertilizer industry. This was challenged by the fluoride promoters in Ohio, but later they were forced to admit this is the truth. They contain traces of lead, arsenic, mercury, kerosene, napha, and other pollutants from the smokestack scrubbers of phosphate factories. They also contain radioactive elements.

WE ALREADY INGEST TOO MUCH FLUORIDE

Fluoride is now in the food chain, thanks to 50 years of water fluoridation, fluoride in pesticides, and airborne pollution. As a result, people are already getting more than the recommended 1 mg per day just from foods and beverages. Fruit juices, baby foods, and other select items are particularly high, due to processing and pesticide residues.

As a result, we don’t need more fluoride. Dental fluorosis, or fluoride toxicity, is a growing problem. An article in the British Medical Journal, Aug. 26, 2000;189:216-220 reported that 54% of the children living in fluoridated areas have signs of fluorosis.

FREEDOM OF CHOICE

Several nations, including Germany, stopped fluoridating because they realized it is immoral to mass medicate the entire population, especially when fluoride tablets, drops, toothpaste and other preparations are inexpensive and readily available.

In 1992, the Safe Water Foundation filed suit against the city of Fond DuLac, Wisconsin (Wisconsin Appellate Case #93-2275). They showed that fluoridation is mass medication of the population with a controlled substance, without the knowledge or consent of the participants. Even for mental patients, consent is required for medical treatment. Additionally, the dosage is not regulated, because some people drink more water than others.

Wealthy people can afford bottled water or expensive reverse osmosis filters to take it out. The poor are forced to drink the medicated water. The poor suffer the most from the toxic effects of fluoride.

LEADING EXPERTS CHANGE THEIR MINDS

Dr. Hardy Limeback, DDS, PhD, is head of the Department of Preventive Dentistry at the University of Toronto, and president of the Canadian Association for Dental Research. He is Canada’s leading fluoride authority, and until recently the nation’s primary fluoride promoter. Two years ago he changed his mind. He publically apologized for 15 years of misleading the people of Canada on the issue of fluoridation. Dr. Limeback said that Toronto, fluoridated for 36 years, has a higher incidence of cavities than Vancouver, which has never fluoridated their water. He said the Centers for Disease Control are basing their fluoride recommendation on 50-year-old studies that don’t reflect new research.

Dr John Colquhoun was the Principal Dental Officer for Auckland, the largest city in New Zealand, and a staunch fluoridation advocate - until he was given the task of reviewing the world-wide data on fluoride effectiveness and safety. His review is titled “Why I Changed My Mind About Fluoridation”. In it, he details how data was manipulated to support fluoridation in the English-speaking countries.

Dr. Phyllis Mullinex was commissioned by the US Army, MEDCOM to research possible neurological effects of fluoridating the water supply at Fort Detrick, Maryland. She worked at Harvard University Dental School. She expected a routine investigation. However, her results shocked even herself when she found that rats fed fluoride developed a variety of neurological defects. She was forced to advise the army not to fluoridate - and lost her job as a result.

Perhaps the most incredible turnaround is by the Environmental Protection Agency’s Union of Scientists and Engineers. In May 1999, they announced they oppose their own agency’s stand on water fluoridation. Senior vice-president of the union, Dr. William Hurzy wrote, “recent, peer-reviewed toxicity data, when applied to EPA’s standard method for controlling risks from toxic chemicals, require an immediate halt to the use of the nation’s drinking water reservoirs as disposal sites for the toxic waste of the phosphate fertilizer industry”.

WHAT DO THE DENTISTS SAY?

I debated the head of the dental society when Phoenix considered fluoridation in 1990, and participated recently in the debate in Wooster, Ohio. The dentists and public health officials did not independently review the recent research. Instead, they continued the refrain that everyone knows fluoride is safe, reduces tooth decay 35-60%, and is worth imposing on everyone as a public health measure.

When challenged, they resorted to character assassination of anyone who does not agree with them. Their basic argument is - trust us and stop asking questions!

WHAT CAUSES TOOTH DECAY?

Dental hygiene and dental care are certainly important factors. A recent review of tooth decay in the Journal of the American Dental Association, July 2000 suggests that fluoride plays a role, but works topically. However, the decline in tooth decay rates worldwide, regardless of fluoridation and before fluoride toothpaste came into widespread use, calls this into question.

Many studies show that poor nutrition, especially consumption of mineral-deficient foods and sugars, negatively affect the teeth. Although largely composed of calcium and phosphorus, many minerals are needed for the teeth. These include zinc, copper, manganese, boron, vanadium and others. Vitamin C helps build the collagen matrix that bones grow within. Vitamin D is very important, and others like vitamin A may also play a role. Refined foods are deficient in minerals and vitamins.

Weston Price, DDS did extensive research on tooth decay around the world. His book, Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, is a classic on dental disease and nutrition. He found that wherever refined, canned and other processed food replaced traditional diets, tooth decay became a major problem. Although some people are more disposed to dental problems that others, it is not a genetic difference. Dr. Price was able to show that in one or two generations the teeth among many groups deteriorated from the use of refined food diets.

CONCLUSION

Except for trusting some dentists and public health officials who may be well-intentioned, but lie and attempt to demolish the character of their opponents, I can find no reason to recommend water fluoridation. You can read the material for yourself and make up your own mind. Your health may depend on it. Wooster, Ohio voted down fluoridation in the 2000 elections. Flagstaff, Arizona also rejected fluoridation in 2001.

Here is another article about fluoridation with some additional information:

AMERICAN CITIZENS AS GUINEA PIGS

By Kelleigh Nelson
September 12, 2010

Fluoride

In the movie, Conspiracy Theory, Mel Gibson says, “You know what they put in the water don’t you? Fluoride! Yeah, fluoride, on the pretext that it strengthens your teeth. That’s ridiculous. You know what this stuff does to you? It actually weakens your will, takes away the capacity for free and creative thought, and makes you a slave to the state.”

It turns out that statement is factual and true. The movie “Conspiracy Theory,” used several absolutely true statements about subjects most constitutionalists are aware of, in a way that “neutralized” the actual facts. The above statement repeated shortly after the movie would be answered with, “Oh, that was in that Conspiracy movie, it’s not really true.” This is a typical tactic of the corporate powers that be and the nanny state, and serves only to negate the truth.

What is sodium Fluoride?

First of all, there is no such substance as “Fluoride” listed in the periodic chart of elements, nor in the Merck Index. Instead, a GAS called fluorine is listed. The use of this gas in various industries such as aluminum manufacturing and the nuclear industry create certain toxic byproducts which have “captured” fluorine molecules. Fluoride waste products are also derived from the industrial manufacture of zinc, uranium, aerosols, insecticides, fertilizers, plastics, lubricants and pharmaceuticals. One such toxic, poisonous “byproduct” is called sodium Fluoride, which according to the Merck Index is primarily used as rat and cockroach poison and is also the active ingredient in most tooth pastes and as an additive to drinking water.

Fluorine is the most highly reactive, and chemically unstable of all existing chemical elements. Fluorine is not found by itself in nature because it is so unstable that it chemically combines, violently in many cases, with practically any other element. Fluorine has the strongest effect of all the halogens (Bromine, Chlorine, Fluorine). Halogens are the non-metallic elements. Fluoride is one of the major ingredients in the controversial psycho-active psychiatric drug, PROZAC which is used so prevalently in the UK that it is now in the water and the filtration systems cannot remove it. And sodium Fluoride is also in the deadly Sarin military nerve gas, designated Isopropyl-Methyl-Phosphoryl Fluoride.

Alcoa Aluminum in Alcoa, TN, near Maryville, is only about 20 minutes from where I live. Fluoride is used to make aluminum. Many years ago I spoke to my veterinarian regarding our dogs and teeth cleaning. Our dogs get their teeth brushed every night with a chicken flavored dog toothpaste that has NO FLUORIDE in it. Why? Because if the dogs swallowed fluoride on a daily basis as they do with the chicken flavored paste, it would kill them. Occasionally, I would have the veterinarian clean our dogs’ teeth while they were under anesthesia. Our vet asked if we wanted a fluoride treatment on their teeth while they were under. I immediately went out and bought a copy of Christopher Bryson’s THE FLUORIDE DECEPTION and gave it to my vet. (This book is available from News With Views and I highly urge you to purchase a copy.) Under no circumstances did I want fluoride used on our pets. In discussing Alcoa Aluminum and their use of fluoride in the manufacture of aluminum products, the vet commented that he’d seen fluorosis in the teeth of cattle near Alcoa where the water is loaded with fluoride. Fluorosis is an irreversible condition caused by excessive ingestion of fluoride during the tooth forming (and bone forming) years which damages the enamel forming cells. It also has destructive effects on the rest of the body.

At the time when sodium Fluoride was first put in the water in Grand Rapids, Michigan in 1945, there were no fluoridated products available commercially. Crest introduced its fluoridated toothpaste in 1955, and Colgate added fluoride in 1967. We now have so many fluoridated products, from our toothpaste to floss and mouthwash, which many choose to use topically. We should be asking, “Why do we need toxic chemical byproducts in our water and all these products?” Check your toothpaste tube, it says in bold, do not swallow. It says this on toothpaste tubes, because toothpaste (fluoride) should most definitely not be swallowed (ingested).

So the question that begs to be asked, why would we think that it is okay to drink (ingest) fluoride, but not swallow toothpaste? The answer is, clearly, it is not okay. There is absolutely no proof that fluoridated water contributes to the dental health of American children.

Despite dental pressure, 99% of western continental Europe has rejected, banned, or stopped fluoridation due to environmental, health, legal, or ethical concerns. Only about 5% of the world population is fluoridated and more than 50% of these people live in North America. Here is a recent news report on Fluoride from Australia.

When was it first used?

This insanity of putting sodium Fluoride into drinking water had its first occurrence in the German ghettos and in Nazi Germany’s infamous concentration camps. The Gestapo had little concern about dental hygiene or the effect on teeth. Their reason for the mass medicating of water with sodium Fluoride was to sterilize humans and force the people in their prison camps into calm, malleable, submissive and docile attitudes. “The Crime and Punishment of I.G. Farben,” by Joseph Borkin goes into detail regarding this very early practice. If you can find a copy, buy it!

Who does it benefit?

Sodium Fluoride is quite expensive for the worlds’ chemical companies to dispose of, but in the 50s and 60s, Alcoa Aluminum and the entire aluminum industry (who had an overabundance of the toxic waste) somehow sold the FDA and our government on the insane and highly profitable idea of buying this poison at a 20,000% markup and injecting it into our water supply and dental rinse.

Of course, much of the water goes down the drain, but we also bathe in it and it is absorbed by our skin. The chemical industry and others have not only a free hazardous waste disposal system, but we also pay them handsomely in the process with taxpayer dollars.

Professor Kaj Roholm, former Chief of the Toxicology Committee for the National Research Council classifies hydrofluorosilic acid and hexafluorosilic acid as “extremely toxic.” One chemical company selling fluoride to water suppliers describes it as “a colorless to straw yellow, transparent, fuming, corrosive liquid with a pungent odor and irritating action on the skin.”

Dr. Phyllis Mullenix

In 1995, Dr. Phyllis Mullenix published a very important work on the neurotoxic effects of fluoride in rat studies. Dr. Mullinex got her PhD in pharmacology from the University of Kansas in 1975. 
From University of Kansas Medical Center she went to John Hopkins School of Public Health in Baltimore between 1975 and 1977. In 1977 she was hired to work at Harvard with Dr. Herbert Needleman on the lead project. She was at the Children's Hospital in Harvard Medical School in the Psychiatry Departments and Department of Neuropathology at the Harvard Med School between 1977 and 1982. Then, in 1982 she went to the Forsythe Dental Center in Boston, first into the Department of Pharmacology and then in 1983 the first toxicology department in any dental research institution in the world was established. She was brought in to head up this department to look at the environmental impact and the toxicity of products that are used by dentists and the dental community. And in particular they specifically mentioned fluoride, mercury, and nitrous oxide.

Her paper concerning the neurotoxicity of sodium fluoride in rats was published in the Neurotoxicology and Teratology Journal, a peer reviewed journal in 1995. The study basically found three things. First of all, sodium fluoride in the drinking water of young animals, showed that with time - meaning a period of weeks in a rat's lifetime - they would develop changes in their behavioral patterns, and that pattern change was a hypo activity pattern. They became slower, like ‘couch potatoes.’ It had a specific pattern to it which was very strikingly similar to the pattern that she had seen in substances or drugs that they used to treat acute lymphocytic leukemia in children, which clinically cause IQ deficits. They also looked at fluoride levels in the brain an hour after IV injections, but Dr. Mullinex felt this did not mimic properly what the population of America was ingesting in their drinking water. What they found after a test on the animals drinking fluoridated water was that there were major accumulations of fluoride in all the regions of the brain, and that some areas looked like there were greater accumulations than others, that were sex-determinant.

Harold Hodge was one of the founders of the Society of Toxicology. He was also one of the chief pharmacologists of the Manhattan Project, and in that Manhattan Project he had done a lot of the studies on toxicology of fluorides, in looking at the adverse effects that you could expect from fluoride extending from the exposures to uranium hexafluoride. (Fluoride was used to make the atomic bomb). Hodge talked about how weird it was during the Manhattan Project, how one scientist couldn't talk to another scientist and go from one laboratory to the next. But he never said anything to Dr. Mullinex that he knew fluoride would affect the central nervous system.

In 1996, after Dr. Hodge's death some investigative reporters, Joel Griffiths and Cliff Honicker, had various declassified documents, and of the documents in this whole series of papers was a request from Harold Hodge to the military, saying something to the effect that they wanted money to do studies to look at the effects of fluoride on the central nervous system in an animal model. They specifically stated that they had evidence, clinical evidence, that fluoride would cause confusion, drowsiness, lassitude, and that they were afraid that workers who worked with uranium hexafluoride were going to become a danger, either to themselves or to other people that they were working with, if they should have their brains effected by fluoride, and that they thought that this is something that should be examined. Hodge also was responsible for human radiation experiments that were discussed in part 4 and 5.

Dr. Mullinex gave her speech regarding her research on fluoride to the National Institute of Health (NIH), mentioned in part 2 of this series, in late 1990. The FDA was there, the National Institute of Dental Health and others. When she mentioned the results of her research on fluoride and the damage she saw, the audience attacked her with questions regarding her research methodology. Eventually she lost her job because of what she exposed. But then she exposed those that fought her and the results of her research.

Many honest scientists have attempted to blow the whistle on sodium fluoride’s false propaganda campaign. They have ended up being “black-listed,” and their valid points disputing the vested interests of these mega corporations never get the press they deserve. If one follows the money the “control” behind this is prominent American families. The 1952 campaign to convince the public of fluoride’s benefits was rammed down our throats by the Public Health Departments and various dental organizations. Sadly, sodium Fluoride has now become usual and common and is even offered in dental offices as specialized treatments for “sensitive teeth” where the gums have receded.

Side effects of sodium Fluoride poison

Independent scientific research evidence over the past 60 plus years has shown that sodium Fluoride shortens our life span, promotes various cancers and mental disturbances, and makes humans stupid, docile, and subservient, all easily done in the drinking water of Americans. There is also increasing evidence that aluminum in the brain is a causative factor in Alzheimer’s Disease, (something we rarely saw with the epidemic proportions of today before the 50s). Evidence points towards sodium Fluoride’s strong affinity to “bond” with this dangerous aluminum (remember it is a byproduct of aluminum manufacturing) and also it has the ability to ‘trick’ the blood-brain barrier by imitating hydrogen ion thus allowing this chemical access to brain tissue.

In 1992, the American scientists, Robert Isaacson, Julie Varner, and Karl Jensen found that fluoridated water carried aluminum into rat brains, producing Alzheimer’s-like changes in brain tissue. Phyllis Mullenix, who gave lab mice moderate doses of fluoride and generated symptoms resembling ADHD, fears that the high incidence of both diseases in the general population is direct evidence of Fluoride’s toxic effects and that both the number and kind of such injuries may worsen in the coming years.

Arthritis, increased risk of hip fracture, Alzheimer’s, heart disease from fluoride concentrates in the arteries which attracts calcium and can contribute to their hardening, thyroid problems, Down’s Syndrome, breathing difficulties, reproduction problems, and other central-nervous-system disorders have all been linked by scientists to fluoride exposure.

Fluorides are cumulative toxins. The fact that fluorides accumulate in the body is the reason that U.S. law requires the Surgeon General to set a Maximum Contaminant Level (MCL) for fluoride content in public water supplies as determined by the EPA. This requirement is specifically for the purpose of avoiding a condition known as Crippling Skeletal Fluorosis (CSF), a disease that progresses through three stages. The MCL, designed to prevent only the third and crippling stage of this disease, is set at 4ppm or 4mg per liter. It was assumed that people retain half of this amount (2mg), and therefore 4mg per liter is considered "safe." However, a daily dose of 2-8 mg is known to cause the third crippling stage of CSF. See this link for historic use of Fluoride.

I would highly suggest the purchase of “The Fluoride Deception” by Christopher Bryson which is available from NewsWithViews. It is probably the most comprehensive book on the subject.

© 2010 Kelleigh Nelson - All Rights Reserved

Of course, be sure you are not drinking fluoride. The only type of water to drink to avoid it, unfortunately, is natural spring water. Carbon filters unfortunately will not remove it. Avoid fancier water filters as they seem to damage the water. Distilled and reverse osmosis water are also fluoride-free, but contain no minerals and should not be used for drinking water for this reason for more than a few months, at most. Never drink reverse osmosis water for any length of time, as it tends not to be well absorbed. Read Water For Drinking for more on this subject.

References

Excellent web sites are www.fluoridealert.org, www.nofluoride.com, and www.fluoridation.com. Of course, there are dental society and government sites that recommend fluoridation.
The following are among the best papers on fluoridation I have come across.

1. Colquhoun, J., “Why I Changed My Mind About Water Fluoridation”, J. Perspectives in Biology and Medicine, 41:1-16, 1997.

2. Denzinger, H.F.J., Konig, H.J., and Kruger, G.E.W., “Fluorine Recovery in the Fertilizer Industry - A Review”, Phosphorus and Potassium #103, Sept/Oct. 1979, pp. 33-39.

3. Griffiths, J. and Bryson, C., “Fluoride, Teeth and the A-Bomb”, Earth Island Journal, Winter 1997-1998, pp. 38-41.

4. Griffiths, J., “Fluoride, Industry’s Toxic Coup”, Earth Island Journal, Spring 1998, pp. 39-41.

5. Hilleman, B., “Fluoridation of Water”, Chemical and Engineering News, Vol. 66, August 1, 1988, pp. 26-42.

6. Mullenix, P., “Details About Fluoride’s Neurotoxicity: Mullenix’s Response To The U.S. Army Medical Command”, May 5, 1999.

7. Price, W., Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, Price-Pottenger Nutrition Foundation, La Mesa, California, 1945, 1975.

8. Walker, M., “Fluoridation Brings Hazards to Human Health”, Townsend Letter for Doctors, May 2000, pp.30-36.

9. Yiamouyiannis, J., Fluoride, The Aging Factor, 1993.

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