How is it that England is one of the few countries in Europe where some health authorities actually elect to add a toxic chemical, fluoride, to drinking water? (The full chemical name is sodium fluoride.) Most other European countries have researched and found the practice to be injurious to health, so much so that, according to the Fluoride Action Network, 97% of Western Europe has refused to add fluoride to their water supply.
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COMPULSORY MEDICATION Fluoride is the only chemical added to drinking water for the purpose of medication; supposedly, to prevent tooth decay. In all other cases chemicals are only added to improve the water's quality and safety, which fluoride does not do. This is one of the reasons why most of Europe, including Scotland, has rejected fluoridation. Before addition to foods, all chemical additives have to be tested for toxicity. After determining the amount found to be toxic to the average person this amount is divided again to ensure that the amount will be safe for almost everybody. For some unaccountable reason, this is not the case with fluoride. The level of fluoride that is deemed optimal is separated by only a small amount from the amount that is known to be harmful. Fluoride is a persistent and non-degradable poison that accumulates in soil, plants, wildlife, and humans. FLUORIDE IN MANY PRODUCTS Unfortunately, it is impossible for members of the public to determine how much fluoride they are ingesting. Even if you avoid commercially packaged foods and drinks, there is plenty of fluoride even in fresh foods, as farm animals may drink fluoridated water and crops are often sprayed with fluoride-based (cryolite) pesticides. Furthermore, after crops are harvested they may be washed or packed using fluoridated water. Other sources of fluoride include fluoride dental products, fluoride insecticides, fluorinated pharmaceuticals, processed foods made with fluoridated water and tea. Fluoridated water is used in the manufacture of soft drinks, fruit juices, and canned soups. RISK TO BABIES In November 2006, the American Dental Association (ADA) advised parents to avoid giving babies fluoridated water. Other dental researchers have made similar recommendations over the past decade. Babies exposed to fluoride are at high risk of developing dental fluorosis, a permanent tooth defect caused by fluoride damaging the cells which form the teeth. According to a review published in the medical journal The Lancet, (8th Nov, 2006), fluoride may also damage the developing brain, causing learning difficulties and other problems. Surprisingly, in the UK, it is the dentists and health authorities that are most in favour of fluoridation in areas of poverty, as it is among the poorer elements of society that the highest incidence of tooth decay is found. However, poor people, especially children who have less than adequate diets, are the very ones most likely to be damaged by the fluoride that is supposed to help them. It is said that children from poor families have 2.3 times as much fluorosis as children from higher income families. POISON WARNING IF SWALLOWED By adding fluoride to everyone's tap water, many other at-risk members of society will be put in harm's way. It should be a matter of choice, so that people who are still convinced that fluoride protects their teeth can choose to use fluoride toothpaste and mouth rinses, which, incidentally, come with explicit instructions not to swallow. Many children ingest more fluoride from toothpaste alone than is considered “optimal” for a full day’s worth of ingestion, according to the Journal of Public Health Dentistry. British toothpastes contain between 1,000 and 1,500 ppm of sodium fluoride and in the USA, since April 1997, all fluoride toothpastes have carried a poison warning. Dr. Hardy Limeback, biochemist and professor of preventative dentistry, University of Toronto, says that children under three years old should never use fluoridated toothpaste. MANY HEALTH RISKS POSED BY FLUORIDE The Fluoride Action Network claims that adverse effects from fluoride ingestion have been associated with doses attainable by people living in fluoridated areas. For example: Risk to the brain. According to the National Research Council (NRC), fluoride can damage the brain. Animal studies conducted in the 1990s by Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) scientists, found dementia-like effects at the same concentration, one part per million (1 ppm), that is used to fluoridate water, while human studies have found adverse effects on IQ at levels as low as 0.9 ppm among children with nutrient deficiencies, and 1.8 ppm among children with adequate nutrient intake. It is not generally known that during WW2 both the Russians and the Nazis added fluoride to the drinking water of their prisoners in order to make them more submissive. Risk to the thyroid gland. According to the NRC, fluoride is an “endocrine disrupter.” Most notably, the NRC has warned that doses of fluoride (0.01-0.03 mg/kg/day) achievable by drinking fluoridated water, may reduce the function of the thyroid among individuals with low-iodine intake. Reduction of thyroid activity can lead to loss of mental acuity, depression and weight gain. Risk to bones. Fluoride can diminish bone strength and increase the risk of bone fracture. While the NRC was unable to determine what level of fluoride is safe for bones, it noted that the best available information suggests that fracture risk may be increased at levels as low 1.5 ppm, which is only slightly higher than the concentration (0.7-1.2 ppm) added to water for fluoridation. Animal and human studies, including a recent study from a team of Harvard scientists, have found a connection between fluoride and a serious form of bone cancer (osteosarcoma) in males under the age of 20. Risk to kidney patients. People with kidney disease have a heightened susceptibility to fluoride toxicity because of the impaired ability to excrete fluoride from the body. As a result, toxic levels of fluoride can accumulate in the bones, intensify the toxicity of aluminium build-up, and cause or exacerbate a painful bone disease known as renal osteodystrophy. CHROMOSOMAL DAMAGE Research at Kings College in London, showed that fluoride forms very strong hydrogen bonds with amides, which are formed when amino acids join together to form a protein. This can cause chromosomal damage. If the protein is distorted, the body’s immune system no longer recognises it, treats it as a foreign protein and will try to destroy it, which in turn triggers allergic skin or gastro-intestinal reactions. HIGHER BLOOD LEAD LEVELS The industrial chemicals used to fluoridate water may present unique health risks not found with naturally occurring fluoride complexes. The chemicals, fluorosilicic acid, sodium silicofluoride and sodium fluoride, are industrial waste products from the phosphate fertilizer industry. Of these chemicals, fluorosilicic acid (FSA) is the most widely used. FSA is a corrosive acid which has been linked to higher blood lead levels in children. A recent study from the University of North Carolina found that FSA can, in combination with chlorinated compounds, leach lead from soldered joints on copper water pipes. Lead is a neurotoxin that can cause learning disabilities and behavioural problems in children. |
BENEFITS EXAGGERATED Cavities do not increase when fluoridation is stopped. In contrast to earlier findings, five studies published since 2000 have reported no increase in tooth decay in communities which have ended fluoridation. Even proponents of water fluoridation admit that benefits to teeth have been exaggerated. DENTAL FLUOROSIS In fluoridated areas, high percentages of the population suffer from dental fluorosis, where teeth are mottled from high deposits of fluoride. In Birmingham, water has been fluoridated at 1 ppm since 1964, and more that a third of children suffer from dental fluorosis. (Ref: Health & Homeopathy, Spring, 1998: 24 –5). DANGEROUS SILICON NOT LISTED In his book ‘Fluoride, Drinking Ourselves to Death?’, Barry Groves says,"the only fluorides that the law in Britain and Ireland allows to be used for water fluoridation are the fluorosilicates, hexafluorosilicic acid (H2SiF6) and its sodium salt, disodium hexafluorosilicate (Na2SiF6). These fluorosilicates, as their name implies, contain silicon, but it is not listed. This omission is significant, because if it were listed, it would have to be labelled and subjected to toxicological studies, as silicon is known to cause cancer. If that weren’t bad enough, these fluorosilicates, in the form in which they are added to drinking water, are not pure. They are classified as ‘hazardous air pollutants". TOXIC SOUP "The products used for water fluoridation for decades are waste from the manufacture of phosphate fertiliser. They are a "soup" of impurities on which no safety testing has ever been done. Scientists have drawn attention to the fact that the only other place this fluorosilicic acid can legally be disposed of is in a hazadous wste facility." Only approximately 19% is fluorine; the rest is a toxic soup containing lead, arsenic, beryllium, vanadium, cadmium, mercury, radionuclides and, of course silicon. The presence of these contaminants is of great concern. Arsenic is classified as a Group 1 known human carcinogen; beryllium is also classified as a known human carcinogen; lead is a known neurotoxicant; arsenic, lead and fluoride are cumulative toxins.” 
Groves goes on to say that if ever over exposure to fluoride were admitted to be harmful, the impact on industry would be catastrophic: companies would be faced with enormous bills for the disposal of this toxic waste, since fluoride is one of the most toxic substances known. He suggests that if word got out, public health services that promote fluoridation, could face massive claims for compensation. Thus, industry and government have a powerful motive for claiming that fluoride is safe.
The Fluoride Action Network offers these tips on how to avoid fluoride toxicity.
Avoid the following drugs which contain fluoride: Prozac (fluoxetine) Rohypnol (flunitrazepam) Diflucan (fluconazole) Flixonase or Flixotide (fluticasone) Stelazine (trifluoperazine) Fluanxol or Depoxol (flupenthixol) Floxapen (flucloxacillin). Over 60 tranquillizers on the market contain fluoride, which profoundly increases the potency of other substances. Fluoridating the ubiquitous tranquillizer Diazepam (Valium) produces a new, stronger tranquillizer, Rohypnol, now known as the date-rape drug. The powerful fluoridated tranquillizer Stelazine, is widely used in retirement homes and mental institutions around the world. The US FDA estimate of Prozac related suicides is 188,000 and deaths 175,000. Prozac is a fluoride compound. CAN WATER AUTHORITIES BE TRUSTED? More than 5 million people in the UK are being exposed to the toxin fluoride, which is a cumulative poison, in their drinking water every day. Just a few weeks ago (Autumn 2014), as a result of public outcry, plans to add fluoride to the water supply in Southampton and parts of Hampshire, have been scrapped. Water authorities are paid good money and trusted by householders to purify and make drinking water safe, instead of which, those authorities that insist on adding fluoride compounds are actually contaminating the water supply, putting people’s health at risk. Isn’t it time this was stopped? |
References
The Lancet. Nov.8th 2006 Developmental Neurotoxicity of Industrial Chemicals.
Fluoride Action Network. www.fluoridealert.org/fluoride-facts.htm
Barry Groves, ‘Fluoride. Are We Drinking Ourselves To Death? ISBN 0-7171-3274-9
The Lancet. Nov.8th 2006 Developmental Neurotoxicity of Industrial Chemicals.
Fluoride Action Network. www.fluoridealert.org/fluoride-facts.htm
Barry Groves, ‘Fluoride. Are We Drinking Ourselves To Death? ISBN 0-7171-3274-9