Question:
In 1951, the US Public Health Service had a secret meeting with the American Dental Association to discuss the promotion of water fluoridation. it was revealed in 1961 by the American Dental Association that the main speaker at this meeting, Dr. Bull[of the state Board of Health], did not know that the meeting was recorded. The meeting disclosed denying the people the right to vote and that the poisonous results of fluoride to the body were unknown and not discussed. Copies may be obtained from the Main Library, Departmentof Health, Education and Welfare, Washington DC. The library file number is RK-301C76-1951. For some excerpts from this meeting: see: http://www.hans.org/flunews2.htm
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Hi Steven, I saw this article and I agree with you. It is so filled up with misconceptions that I did not know where to start. Thanks for your patient review! Cheers, Joel Joel M. Eichen, D.D.S. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Excerpts from silly article about the Manhattan project and fluorine: Fluoride was the key chemical in atomic bomb production, according to the documents. Massive quantities of fluoride – millions of tons – were essential for the manufacture of bomb-grade uranium and plutonium for nuclear weapons throughout the Cold War. One of the most toxic chemicals known, the documents reveal that fluoride rapidly emerged as the leading chemical health hazard of the U.S. atomic bomb program – both for workers and for nearby communities.
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Additional notes by Darlene Sherrell (Darlene Sherrell not only discovered that the original Roholm/Hodge safety figures had been misc-alculated and then persisted with the help of Dr.Bob Carton and Senator Bob Graham in her efforts to get the National Research Council (NAS/NRC) to adopt the new figures – which had even been corrected by Hodge himself in 1979-but also managed to change the law in Michigan, giving people the right to vote on fluoridation. Michigan was the first state in the US to repeal their mandatory fluoridation law. – AS) Harold C. Hodge and the U.S. Army Dr. Hodge is deceased. However, in 1979 his chapter in a book titled "Continuing Evaluation of the Use of Fluorides" set the record straight. With regard to the "safe" dosage of fluoride for
fact about dental fluorosis is this: no safe established daily intake exists, i.e., the maximal amount in mg fluoride which consumed daily does NOT produce cosmetically damaging extensive white areas or brown stain in some individuals has not been fixed." In the same publication, Dr. Hodge also corrected his figures for crippling skeletal fluorosis. In his calculations made during the early 1950s it appears, although not spelled out, that Hodge had neglected to convert pounds to kilograms. As a result, most reviews which contain the "crippling daily dose of fluoride," including the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services 1991 document, Review of Fluoride: Benefits andRisks, as well as the current Recommended Dietary Allowances (RDA) and the new Dietary Reference Intakes (DRI) — another document from the Institute of Medicine — use 20-80 mg/day figures. (Although these documents refer to Hodge, and the first two specifically refer to Hodge 1979, they completely ignore Hodge’s 1979 correction of the older erroneous figures.) Sandra Schlicker, study director for the DRI, has acknowledged her understanding of Hodge’s error, as well as the correction in 1979; yet, offers no explanation for using the older erroneous figures. In addition, this latest report dismisses the correction made by another NAS/NRC panel in 1993, falsely claiming the corrected figures for "Crippling" were meant to apply only to the earlier non-crippling stages of the disease. The bottom line is this: At currently reported intake levels, excess fluoride from multiple sources has surpassed the quantity known to cause serious adverse health effects within about forty years. (i.e., 5 mg/day will cause crippling deformities of the spine and major joints) Within about twenty years, with a daily intake of 5 mg, the symptoms to be expected include chronic joint pain as well as brittle bones. Knowing full well that five milligrams of fluoride daily would be expected to produce phase 3 crippling skeletal fluorosis in the average individual after about 40 years, the committee has determined that 10 milligrams of fluoride daily is "tolerable." The question, "Tolerable to whom?" remains unanswered. More about the Army Although facilities had been constructed to provide fluoride in the drinking water system at Ft. Detrick, key components corroded to the point that the system was shut down. Reinstating fluoridation became subject to regulations involving an environmental assessment. On 11 December 1996 Commander, Colonel Henry O. Tuell, III, wrote toU.S. Army Medical Command, Fort Sam Houston, Texas. In this memo Colonel Tuell states: "…recent research and findings regarding efficacy of fluoridation and the adverse health effects, could be serious." In other words, drinking fluoridated water may be unsafe. As yet, the Army post at Fort Detrick, (Frederick, Maryland) remains unfluoridated.
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Re: Water fluoridation – The Truth The following important scanning/transmission errors was brought to my attention: #5/8 Paragraph: In his letter transmitting the final report of the Committee to EPA, Surgeon General Koop said that arthritis and CSF both begin to occur simultaneously, when fluoride consumption exceeds 0 mg/day. He also added the caveat that it takes more than 20 years to cause these effects. His assertion differed from the conclusion of the National Academy of Science, which also was a source of advice to EPA on this matter. The NAS, according to EPA in the proposed regulation, reported that it takes only 10 years to cause CSF at a dose of 20 mg/day. EPA, however, decided in the proposed regulation to use Dr. Koop’s numbers: should read:(IMPORTANT!!!) In his letter transmitting the final report of the Committee to EPA, Surgeon General Koop said that arthritis and CSF both begin to occur simultaneously, when fluoride consumption exceeds *20* mg/day. He also added the caveat that it takes more than 20 years to cause these effects. His assertion differed from the conclusion of the National Academy of Science, which also was a source of advice to EPA on this matter. The NAS, according to EPA in the proposed regulation, reported that it takes only 10 years to cause CSF at a dose of 20 mg/day. EPA, however, decided in the proposed regulation to use Dr. Koop’s numbers: Also #5/8 Sorry for any confusion this might have caused. Besides the occasional run-on sentence and the transmission layout discrepancy, everything else seems to be truthfully reproduced. Regards, AS A new version will be sent, as to avoid confusion, for dosage discussion is of utmost importance. Old one will be cancelled.
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Do you know of the fraud studies done at the University of Rochester? This is incorrect information. I have read those studies and they do not implicate fluoride in any way. Cheers, Joel M. Eichen, D.D.S.
Dr. El Ignoro, I challenge you to post the ones you have read. Otherwise you
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- Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – ABOUT THE AUTHORS: Joel Griffiths is a medical writer who lives in New York City. Author of a book on radiation hazards, he has contributed numerous articles to medical and popular publications. Chris Bryson, who holds a masters degree in Journalism, is an independent reporter with ten years’ professional experience. He has worked with BBC Radio and Public Television in New York, plus numerous publications, including the Christian Science Monitor and the Mansfield Guardian.
Excerpts from silly article about the Manhattan project and fluorine: Fluoride was the key chemical in atomic bomb production, according to the documents. Massive quantities of fluoride – millions of tons – were essential for the manufacture of bomb-grade uranium and plutonium for nuclear weapons throughout the Cold War. One of the most toxic chemicals known, the documents reveal that fluoride rapidly emerged as the leading chemical health hazard of the U.S. atomic bomb program – both for workers and for nearby communities.
Comment: Actually elemental fluorine gas (F2) is one of the most toxic chemicals known, not fluoride (F- ion). They are different things, just as one would suspect from the different spelling, even if one was a scientifically uneducated newspaper reporter. There’s an "n" in fluorine– see? It takes 5 or 10 grams of fluoride to kill you, and I promise that this is hardly one of the most toxic chemicals known. Fluorine gas is dangerous for two reasons. The first is that is an incredibly powerful oxidant (the strongest known), and causes direct damage to organics (flesh) by reacting with them. Fluorine is also highly corrosive to water because it produces hydrofluoric acid on contact with water (as when breathed), and hydrofluoric acid is a flesh penetrating corrosive agent which causes burns and enzyme destruction. Fluorine gas was indeed critical to the Manhattan project. Uranium 235 is produced by running the volatile compound uranium hexafluoride (HEX — UF6) though gas centrifuges. UF6 is made by reacting uranium oxides or metal with F2 (fluorine gas). However, the reaction equilibrium insures that no sample of UF6 will ever be pure, for pure UF6 also spontaneously breaks down to small amounts of UF4 (a solid) and fluorine gas, F2. The F2 is corrosive to standard pipes, and the reaction above necessitated handing UF6 gas as though it was F2. This in turn led to the nickel technology which is the key to fluorine gas handling today (previously fluorine had to handled in platinum plated equipment). None of which has a thing to do with fluoride toxicity. UF6 is toxic because it reacts quickly with water (the water in your lungs) to produce– you guessed it: hydrofluoric acid. Hydrofluoric acid (HF), is a lipid soluble poison which is many times more poisonous than simple fluoride ion. Confusing the two is bad science. Standard journlism but bad science. The first lawsuits against the U.S. A-bomb program were not over radiation, but over fluoride damage, the documents reveal.<< Comment: Actually, they reveal no such thing. If a chemical was released into the air, it cannot have been an ordinary fluoride (UF6 would surely not have been released–it’s radioactive and there would have been hell to pay from that). If it contained fluorine and was a gas (like UF6 or HF), it was something much more hazardous than garden variety metal salt fluorides used to fluoridate drinking water. When "medical writers" start talking about "fluoride released into the atmosphere" (as this article does) they only make me think of the old saw about journalism being that profession whose buisiness it is to explain that which it personally does not understand. Read a few newspaper articles about anything at all which you personally know something about, and you’ll see what I mean. The impact can be seen, literally, in the smiles of our children. Large numbers of U.S. young people – up to 80 percent in some cities – now have dental fluorosis, the first visible sign of excessive fluoride exposure, according to the U.S. National Research Council.<< Comment: 80% in one city. Averages in other cities are small. A very deceptive statement. Fluorosis has been increasing in incidence in past years. That does not mean it is epidemic. Less known to the public is that fluoride also accumulates in bones – "The teeth are windows to what’s happening in the bones," explains Paul Connett, Professor of Chemistry at St. Lawrence (N.Y.) University.<< Comment Goodness. All these children with white spots on their bones. The mind reels. In recent years, pediatric bone specialists have expressed
alarm about an increase in stress fractures among U.S. young people. Connett and other scientists are concerned that fluoride – linked to bone damage by studies since the 1930’s – may be a contributing factor.<< Comment: Scaremongering. Where’s the beef? "Information was buried," concludes Dr. Phyllis Mullenix,
former head of toxicology at Forsyth Dental Center in Boston, and now a critic of fluoridation. Animal studies Mullenix and co-workers conducted at Forsyth in the early 1990’s indicated that fluoride was a powerful central nervous system (CNS) toxin, and might adversely affect human brain functioning, even at low doses. << Comment: "Might?" "Even at low doses?" None of this is justified from the work, which subjected rats to 75 – 120 ppm fluoride (!), a concentration 75 to 100 times that in fluoridated drinking water, and a dose in mg/kg for the rat of 9 – 15 mg/kg per day, which is 90 to 150 times total human exposure even in high fluoride areas (this is due to the fact that rats drink more water per kg than humans). The work must in best case be repeated before it can be taken seriously. Even when it is repeated, its relevance for all but seriously fluoride poisoned humans is dubious. (New epidemiological
evidence from China adds support, showing a correlation between low-dose fluoride exposure and diminished I.Q. in children.)<< Comment: Somebody on this newspaper must read Chinese. The abstract of this paper says no such thing, and indeed makes no sense at all. I am unable to evaluate this claim, and regard it as hearsay. Mullenix’s results were published in 1995, in a
reputable peer-reviewed scientific journal.<< Comment: And criticized in the same journal. See the commentary: Neurotoxicol Teratol 1995 Nov-Dec;17(6):685-8) After reviewing the [declassified Manhattan project memos on
possible CNS toxicity of UF6], Mullenix declared herself "flabbergasted." She went on, "how could I be told by NIH that fluoride has no central nervous system effects when these documents were sitting there all the time?" << Comment: A memo from 1944 in a government file amounts to hearsay, not scientific evidence. In any case, the NIH does not make grant decisions (except in a few cases). As a rule, grants are peer reviewed. Fluoride may or may not cause CNS effects, but UF6 might well do things in the CNS that fluoride cannot. Indeed, acute UF6 toxicity is not due to "fluoride," but rather to hydrofluoric acid. Both UF6 and HF penetrate to places (such as the brain) where fluoride has more difficulty penetrating. The author of the 1944 CNS research proposal was Dr. Harold
C. Hodge, at the time chief of fluoride toxicology studies for the University of Rochester division of the Manhattan Project. Nearly fifty years later at the Forsyth Dental Center in Boston, Dr. Mullenix was introduced to a gently ambling elderly man brought in to serve as a consultant on her CNS research – Harold C. Hodge. By then Hodge had achieved status emeritus as a world authority on fluoride safety. "But even though he was supposed to be helping me," says Mullenix, "he never once mentioned the CNS work he had done for the Manhattan Project."<< Comment: Maybe he thought it was still classified, and since it was work on Uf6 and not F-, perhaps he thought it was not relevant. Indeed, perhaps he knew something that Dr. Mullinex did not. Dr. Antonio Noronha, an NIH scientific review advisor familiar with Dr. Mullenix’s grant request, says her proposal was rejected by a scientific peer-review group. He terms her claim of institutional bias against fluoride CNS research "farfetched" he adds, "We strive very hard at NIH to make sure politics does not enter the picture."<< Comment: It is a fact that NIH grants are peer-reviewed. That means (in short) that the government only decides how much money is available, not who gets it. Who gets it is decided by unpaid committees of non-government scientists in the field (one’s "peers"– that’s what the word means). If Dr. Mullenex thinks her grant was rejected by the NIH, she needs to learn about the process. It may not be fair, but it’s the best anyone has been able to come up with. Steve Harris, M.D. Chung Hua Liu Hsing Ping Hsueh Tsa Chih 1994 Oct;15(5):296-298 [Effects of high iodine and high fluorine on children's intellig- ence and the metabolism of iodine and fluorine]. [Article in Chinese] Yang Y, Wang X, Guo X Shandong Provincial Institute of Endemic Disease Control, Jinan. An investigation on children’s intelligence and the metabolism of iodine and fluorine in high iodine and fluorine regions was carried out. The results were as follows. In high iodine and high fluorine areas, the thyroid enlargement prevalence rate among inhabitants and that among children were 3.8% and 29.8%, respe- ctively. The dental fluorosis prevalence rate among inhabitants and that among children was 35.48% and 72.9%, respectively. The pupils’ average intelligence quotient (IQ) was 76.67 +/- 7.75, slightly lower than the control point, but that … read more »
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ABOUT THE AUTHORS: Joel Griffiths is a medical writer who lives in New York City. Author of a book on radiation hazards, he has contributed numerous articles to medical and popular publications. Chris Bryson, who holds a masters degree in Journalism, is an independent reporter with ten years’ professional experience. He has worked with BBC Radio and Public Television in New York, plus numerous publications, including the Christian Science Monitor and the Mansfield Guardian.
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Part2) Much of the proof of fluoride’s safety in low doses rests on the postwar work performed by the University of Rochester, in anticipation of lawsuits against the bomb program for human injury. Fluoride and the Cold War Delegating fluoride safety studies to the University of Rochester was not surprising. During World War II the federal government had become involved, for the first time, in large scale funding of scientific research at government-owned labs and private colleges. Those early spending priorities were shaped by the nation’s often-secret military needs. The prestigious upstate New York college, in particular, had housed a key wartime division of the Manhattan Project, studying the health effects of the new "special materials," such as uranium, plutonium, beryllium and fluoride, being used to make the atomic bomb. That work continued after the war, with millions of dollars flowing from the Manhattan Project and its successor organization, the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC). (Indeed, the bomb left an indelible imprint on all U.S. science in the late 1940’s and 50’s. Up to 90% of federal funds for university research came from either the Defense Department or the AEC in this period, according to Noam Chomsky’s 1996 book "The Cold War and the University.") The University of Rochester medical school became a revolving door for senior bomb program scientists. Postwar faculty included Stafford Warren, the top medical officer of the Manhattan Project, and Harold Hodge, chief of fluoride research for the bomb program. But this marriage of military secrecy and medical science bore deformed offspring. The University of Rochester’s classified fluoride studies code-named Program F — were conducted at its Atomic Energy Project (AEP), a top-secret facility funded by the AEC and housed in Strong Memorial Hospital. It was there that one of the most notorious human radiation experiments of the Cold War took place, in which unsuspecting hospital patients were injected with toxic doses of radioactive plutonium. Revelation of this experiment in a Pulitzer prize-winning account by Eileen Welsome led to a 1995 U.S. Presidential investigation, and a multimillion-dollar cash settlement for victims. Program F was not about children’s teeth. It grew directly out of litigationagainst the bomb program, and its main purpose was to furnish scientific ammunition which the government and its nuclear contractors could use to defeat lawsuits for human injury. Program F’s director was none other than Harold C. Hodge, who had led the Manhattan Project investigation of alleged human injury in the New Jersey fluoride-pollution incident. Program F’s purpose is spelled out in a classified 1948 report. It reads: "To supply evidence useful in the litigation arising from an alleged loss of a fruit crop several years ago, a number of problems have been opened. Since excessive blood fluoride levels were reported in human residents of the same area, our principal effort has been devoted to describing the relationship of blood fluorides to toxic effects." The litigation referred to, of course, and the claims of human injury were against the bomb program and its contractors. Thus, the purpose of Program F was to obtain evidence useful in litigation against the bomb program. The research was being conducted by the defendants. The potential conflict of interest is clear. If lower dose ranges were found hazardous by Program F, it might have opened the bomb program and its contractors to lawsuits for injury to human health, as well as public outcry. Comments lawyer Kittrell: "This and other documents indicate that the University of Rochester’s fluoride research grew out of the New Jersey lawsuits and was performed in anticipation of lawsuits against the bomb program for human injury. Studies undertaken for litigation purposes by the defendants would not be considered scientifically acceptable today," adds Kittrell, "because of their inherent bias to prove the chemical safe." Unfortunately, much of the proof of fluoride’s safety rests on the work performed by Program F Scientists at the University of Rochester. During the postwar period that university emerged as the leading academic center for establishing the safety of fluoride, as well as its effectiveness in reducing tooth decay, according to Dental School spokesperson William H.Bowen, M.D. The key figure in this research, Bowen said, was Harold C. Hodge — who also became a leading national proponent of fluoridating public drinking water. Program F’s interest in water fluoridation was not just "to counteract the local fear of fluoride on the part of residents," as Hodge had earlier written. The bomb program needed human studies, as they had needed human studies for plutonium, and adding fluoride to public water supplies provided one opportunity. The A-Bomb Program and Water Fluoridation Bomb-program scientists played a prominent — if unpublicized — role in the nation’s first-planned water fluoridation experiment, in Newburgh, New York. The Newburgh Demonstration Project is considered the most extensive study of the health effects of fluoridation, supplying much of the evidence that low doses are safe for children’s bones, and good for their teeth. Planning began in 1943 with the appointment of a special New York State Health Department committee to study the advisability of adding fluoride to Newburgh’s drinking water. The chairman of the committee was Dr. Hodge, then chief of fluoride toxicity studies for the Manhattan Project. Subsequent members included Henry L. Barnett, a captain in the Project’s Medical section, and John W. Fertig, in 1944 with the U.S. Office of Scientific Research and Development, the Pentagon group which sired the Manhattan Project. Their military affiliations were kept secret: Hodge was described as a pharmacologist, Barnett as a pediatrician. Placed in charge of the Newburgh project was David B. Ast, chief dental officer of the State Health Department. Ast had participated in a secret wartime conference on fluoride held by the Manhattan Project, and later worked with Dr. Hodge on the Project’s investigation of human injury in the New Jersey incident, according to once-secret memos. The committee recommended that Newburgh be fluoridated. It also selected the types of medical studies to be done, and "provided expert guidance" for the duration of the experiment. The key question to be answered was: "Are there any cumulative effects — beneficial or otherwise, on tissues and organs other than the teeth — of long-continued ingestion of such small concentrations…?" According to the declassified documents, this was also key information sought by the bomb program, which would require long-continued exposure of workers and communities to fluoride throughout the Cold War. In May 1945, Newburgh’s water was fluoridated, and over the next ten years its residents were studied by the State Health Department. In tandem, Program F conducted its own secret studies, focusing on the amounts of fluoride Newburgh citizens retained in their blood and tissues — the information sought by the bomb program: "Possible toxic effects of fluoride were in the forefront of consideration," the advisory committee stated. Health Department personnel cooperated, shipping blood and placenta samples to the Program F team at the University of Rochester. The samples were collected by Dr. David B. Overton, the Department’s chief of pediatric studies at Newburgh. The final report of the Newburgh Demonstration Project, published in 1956 in the Journal of the American Dental Association, concluded that "small concentrations" of fluoride were safe for U.S. citizens. The biological proof — "based on work performed … at the University of Rochester Atomic Energy Project" — was delivered by Dr. Hodge. Today, news that scientists from the atomic bomb program secretly shaped and guided the Newburgh fluoridation experiment, and studied the citizen’s blood and tissue samples, is greeted with incredulity. "I’m shocked — beyond words," said present-day Newburgh Mayor Audrey Carey, commenting on these reporters’ findings. "It reminds me of the Tuskegee experiment that was done on syphilis patients down in Alabama." As a child in the early 1950’s, Mayor Carey was taken to the old firehouse on Broadway in Newburgh, which housed the Public Health clinic. There, doctors from the Newburgh fluoridation project studied her teeth, and a peculiar fusion of two finger bones on her left hand she had been born with. Today, adds Carey, her granddaughter has white dental-fluorosis marks on her front teeth. Mayor Carey wants answers from the government about the secret historyof fluoride, and the Newburgh fluoridation experiment. "I absolutely want to pursue it," she said. "It is appalling to do any kind of experimentation and study without people’s knowledge and permission." Contacted by these reporters, the director of the Newburgh experiment, David B. Ast, says he was unaware Manhattan Project scientists were involved. "If I had known, I would have been certainly investigating why, and what the connection was," he said. Did he know that blood and placenta samples from Newburgh were being sent to bomb program researchers at the University of Rochester? "I was not aware of it," Ast replied. Did he recall participating in the Manhattan Project’s secret wartime conference on fluoride in January 1944, or going to New Jersey with Dr. Hodge to investigate human injury in the du Pont cases as secret memos state? He said he had no recollection of these events. A spokesperson for the University of Rochester Medical Center, Bob Loeb, confirmed that blood and tissue samples from Newburgh had … read more »
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The anonymous brou+AEA-istar.ca challenges me: +AD4- +AD4-Did you read the original post? Obviously not. Of course not. You are an obvious nut, and life is much too short for one to bother with your long trail of blither. -dlj.
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That’s interesting, to say the least…Well, here is Dr.Harris, who suggests a post on the list re:the MedLine abstracts, then wants a clarification which also gets posted with official NRC/NAS/Department of Health figures from 1993(!) clearly stating that current (93) intake exceeds 6.5mg in optimally fluoridated areas…<< Comment: The hardly means that the average exceeds 6.5 mg. Rather it means that 6.5 is the highest they saw. Averages are considerably lower,and if they were not, we would see mass dental fluorosis (more kids would have it than not), something which happens at F levels such that adults get around 6 mg/day, and which happens long before toxicity from F is reached. Where is this dental flourosis in every child– the fluorosis we use as a marker to tell us when we’re reaching the beginning of toxicity? And you offer this nonsense as proof of your statement that average intakes exceed 8 mg in some parts of the United States, due to fluoridation and the nasty industry allowing more fluoride in baby food. Sorry, we know better. Actually, the only places where fluoride intake exceeds 8 mg on average for adults are places drinking naturally high F water supplies, like Bartlett, Texas (8 ppm = 8 mg/L = 20 mg/day for adults). Where except for discolored (but hard and cavity-free) teeth, the inhabitants are fine. They’ve been drinking that stuff for a century, now. Say, when are all these bad things from chronic F poisoning supposed to start happening to them? Any time now, I’ll bet. Further he is invited to research links on the matter, again, full of official Gov’t-agency figures, some of them directly leading to the document in question…You either have selective reading skills or you do have a different agenda here…<< Comment: Excuse me? Let’s talk about different agendas. On this website of yours I’m offered a document, which you also post, in which it states that 6 mg or more a day of F causes "fluorosis." The symptoms of which are given as weak bones, weight loss, anemia, and general ill health. This is utter nonsense, and means possibly that somebody has confused dental fluorosis (harmless discoloration of teeth, which starts at about 0.1 mg/kg/day, close to 6 mg/d for an adult) with osteofluorosis (F induced bone disease) and fluoride poisoning. The only justification given for this is a calculation that retention of 2 mg a day of fluoride for 40 years will result in enough skeletal fluoride deposition for osteofluorosis. Alas, there are only a few problems with this calculation. Chief among them is that the author who made them (Spencer) must have revised his numbers, since in 1981 he finds that people retain only 1 mg a day on a dietary intake of 4.3 mg, figures which are born out by metabolic ward studies. Wups. Might take you 80 years. That is, if it weren’t for the *other* problem. That being that nobody has yet seen much osteofluorosis (or mass anemia and weight loss, either) even in communities like Bartlett, with naturally fluoridated water where intakes really do exceed 8 mg/day by a factor of 2 or 3. So there’s something wrong with the math, or the assumptions. A "day in the life" of somebody in Bartlett should be a nightmare to make yours look like a day- dream. Except it isn’t. A beautiful theory killed off by a nasty ugly fact! Which means you need to go back to the drawing board. Obviously, lifetime intakes cause F balance changes which don’t look like those you see over months. People don’t retain 2 mg a day for decades. Rather the skeleton hits an equilibrium at some point at 5-10 years, after all bone has been turned over and all old bone (the stuff being broken down) has been formed in the presence of fluoride, and thus releases fluoride on breakdown. It’s new bone forming in the presence of fluoride, when the bone being broken down has not, which causes net skeletal uptake of fluoride. As soon as bone being broken down has as much fluoride in it as does bone being formed, skeletal net uptake stops. At that point, you must raise F concentration to get it to continue upward. BTW, that website also contains a breezy discussion of fluoride metabolism which is only valid for dissolved fluoride. Somebody forgot to mention that fluoride in solid foods is quite a bit less bioavailable than fluoride in water and beverages, so you cannot just add up all the fluoride in the diet to one big number. Urinary fluoride levels (which track absorbed F pretty well) need to be measured to see how equivalent of dissolved fluoride ion people are really getting. You have presented NO evidence of this sort. And also, for some reason, your website seems to have glossed over studies finding considerably lower F intakes for both adults and children in the US, done years (1980’s) after the ones you cite in the 1970’s. I’m sure you know them if you’ve done as much research as you say. Must I quote? Is your idea of a balanced and rational argument to simply ignore later data which doesn’t agree with you? The Dept of Health, BTW, isn’t composed of superscientists or Gods. The men and women there are subject to the same scientific standards as the rest of us. Where are their papers about US fluoride consumption in the 90’s, published in peer-reviewed journals? They seem to be missing. Let me explain something to you. I have no interest in having a war with anyone on this matter.<< Please. Let me explain something to YOU. I really don’t give a flying banana what your interests are. If you show up here with medical statements which are bunk, I’m going to ask for your evidence. If the evidence you present does not back up your claims, and if you’re nasty about it, I’m going to embarrass you. You can answer my posts or not– I don’t care. But when you post nonsense, I’m going to point it out– at least if it’s obvious. I have researched this issue for many 100’s of hours, maybe 1000’s, and will continue to do so. (By the way, so have many, many other people, at great expense. The ones you might recognize have even been mentioned, such as Dr.Albert Schatz and Dr.Phyllis Mullenix.)<< Comment: That’s nice. Have somebody who knows something about fluoride write your literature. There’s a thought. I have also no interest in responding to the same old ignorant remarks over and over on this list. What I am offering you is a gift, and you, as well as a few others here seem to abuse it.<< Comment: What you’re offering so far is deception (see above). That’s no gift, unless you like to count the kinds of gifts that Greeks brought to Troy. We’ll see how much you resist the facts before we can finally call it "lies." I can take ignorant people, because they can be taught. I can take ignorant stupid people, because they too can be taught, with patience. What I really cannot abide is dishonest people. Steve Harris, M.D. Am J Clin Nutr 1980 Feb;33(2):328-332 Fluoride intakes of young male adults in the United States. Singer L, Ophaug RH, Harland BF The total daily fluoride intake for young male adults living in four geographical areas of the United States has been estimated by the analysis of "market basket collections" obtained in 1975 and 1977. The fluoride intake in 1975 vaired from 0.912 mg/day in an unfluoridated city (Kansas City, Mo.) to 1.720 mg/day in a fluoridated city (Atlanta, Ga.). The 1977 collection from San Francisco, Calif. contained more fluoride (1.636 mg/day) than the 1975 collection (1.213 mg/day). The level of intake found in this study is less than that reported by San Filippo and Battistone (Clin. Chem. Acta 31: 453, 1971) who analyzed similar collections from Baltimore, Md. in 1967 to 1968 (2.09 to 2.34 mg/day). This study, as well as the earlier one, indicates that relatively low levels of fluoride are being consumed in the United States by the young adult male 16 to 19 years of age. PMID: 7355803, UI: 80127267 Sci Total Environ 1981 Jan;17(1):1-12 Studies of fluoride metabolism in man. A review and report of original data. Spencer H, Osis D, Lender M The dietary intake of fluoride and the fluoride excretions in urine and stool were determined under controlled conditions in man. Fluoride balance studies have shown that the urinary fluoride corresponds to 50–60% of the intake, the fecal fluoride was very low, corresponding to 6% of the intake, and approximately 1 mg fluoride was retained per day during an average fluoride intake of 4.3 mg/day. The fluoride intake depended on the amount of fluoridated water consumed. The dietary fluoride content ranged from 1.2 to 1.5 mg/day. During the intake of supplemental fluoride the fluoride excretions increased but the ratio of the urinary/fecal fluoride was similar. Added fluoride is well retained. Following its discontinuation, very small amounts of the retained fluoride are excreted for several days. Inorganic elements, such as calcium, phosphorus, and magnesium, which have been shown to decrease the intestinal absorption of fluoride in animals were ineffective in man, while aluminum, given as aluminum-containing antacids, markedly decreased the intestinal absorption of fluoride and thereby decreased the retention of fluoride. Am J Clin Nutr 1981 Dec;34(12):2679-2684 Fluoride balance studies in ambulatory healthy men with and without fluoride supplements. Maheshwari UR, McDonald JT, Schneider VS, Brunetti AJ, Leybin L, Newbrun E, Hodge HC Fluoride balances were determined in healthy adult males under metabolic ward conditions. This is the first fluoride study to use the diffusion method in exploring the balances of subjects ingesting basal (i.e., everyday) diets with deionized water for cooking and drinking. Certain groups were given daily supplements of 5 or 10 mg. fluoride as sodium fluoride in … read more »
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Misread. I have not fluoridated (the gel stuff) extensively in the past 20 years. I advocate municipal fluoridation because patients do not take this seriously. Therefore I approve of BIG BROTHER doing it! But I am afraid of fluorosis, so I make sure to select my patients carefully for topical fluoride. And, yes, I agree that this can be dangerous stuff if overdone. Cheers, Joel Joel M. Eichen, D.D.S. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Hi Joel Thanks for the post! This is most interesting! I am a practicing dentist who rarely administers fluoride to patients who live in areas of municpal fluoridation, or grew up in those areas either. Indiscriminate use of fluoride were one of your main arguments when Fluor was the topic some months ago. You described its proven lack of potential dangers to human health. Next to amalgam fluor was the best thing in the world and no restrictions of its use were necessary. So, of course I wonder; have you changed since then or have you different opinions depending on what month it is??? Or did I totally misread your former posts on municipal fluoridation? Just wondering, Hans
Response:
The following article exposes the biggest on-going medical experiment ever carried out by the United States Government on an unsuspecting population. Although commissioned by the Christian Science Monitor in early Spring of 1997, it has not yet been published. Readers are invited to inquire when publication can be expected, by calling the Christian Science Monitor at 1-800-288-7090. . . . . . Fluoride, Teeth, and the Atomic Bomb by Joel Griffiths and Chris Bryson
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