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POST CARD FROM SAN ANTONIO
The Other Motive Behind
Fluoridation
By Benedict D. LaRosa
In politics, it is usually
power and money which motivate those who seek to impose their will on
others.
It is easy to see the money
motive behind fluoridation. The aluminium processing, phosphate fertilizer,
and nuclear weapon industries have a financial interest in ridding
themselves, as inexpensively as possible, of a toxic waste - fluoride.
To their credit, they have
found a way to turn an expensive disposal problem into a profitable
business. If their solution were not so unethical and immoral, one would
marvel at their ingenuity in turning a liability into an asset.
Money, in part, is also the
motivator behind the politicians and medical/dental professionals who
support the involuntary mass medication of entire populations.
Politicians are able to
justify higher taxes, build bigger bureaucracies, perpetuate themselves in
office, and solidify their power base through contributions from these
industries, all at the expense of the tax and rate payers. Medical/dental
professionals whose training and work are subsidised by government and
industry gain because of the grants they receive from these entities if they
succeed in putting this waste product into municipal water supplies.
Former city council member
and county commissioner, Helen Dutmer, tells the story of a representative
from the state health department who visited her in 1985 during the last
fluoride fight. The health department representative explained that hundreds
of thousands of dollars in federal grant money were at stake for the
University of Texas Health Science Center Dental School.
If fluoride were not
passed, it would mean not only the loss of that money, but future grants to
the school.
There is another motivator
- elitism. During the last fluoride fight (1984-85), the Bexar Safe Water
Committee obtained, through a Freedom of Information request, a letter
addressed to the then Surgeon General of the United States, Dr. C. Everett
Koop, requesting his help to support fluoridation, in fighting a public
referendum on fluoridation. It was signed by some of the most prominent men
and women in San Antonio.
The letter contains one
sentence which summarises the fear of the political/medical/business
establishment.
“If we give up now, will
these other public health advances come under attack by those not
qualified to make health decisions?”
This is elitism at its
finest.
You and I, and everyone
else who are not part of their group are not qualified to make our own
health decisions, and must be prevented from doing so at all costs. People
in positions of power and authority often succumb to the sin of pride,
thinking their judgment is not only better, but that it must also dominate,
even at the expense of individual liberty.
How often have you heard
pro-fluoridationists say that the right of the individual to determine what
he puts into his body must be sacrificed for the good of society?
Fluoridation is a freedom
challenging issue because the essence of freedom is choice. Without choice,
there is no freedom.
No one who wants fluoride
is prevented from getting it. Fluoridated product are inexpensive and
available throughout the city. Why should choice be denied to those who
don’t want it, don’t need it, or who would be harmed by it?
Does freedom end at the
tap?
Only in veterinary medicine
does the patient have no say in his treatment. You can’t be for freedom and
for fluoridation.
Make your choice, but
please don’t make it for me.
Copyright 2000 By
SanAntonioLight.Com
Permission to print
granted.
Canadian study: Stop fluoridation in water
A new report from the
Canadian government claims that fluoridation in water probably does more
harm than good.
Report author Dr. David
Locker, a professor of dentistry at the University of Toronto, suggests that
the best solution is to cease fluoridation.
"No Canadian studies
provide evidence that water fluoridation is effective in reducing (tooth)
decay in contemporary child populations," says Locker, author of the 2001
"Benefits and Risks of Water Fluoridation," prepared for the Ontario
Ministry of Health and Health Canada.
He says that current
studies support the view that dental fluorosis has increased at a rate of
20-75 percent in communities where the water is fluoridated and by 12-45
percent in communities with non-fluoridated water. Current fluoridation
studies are flawed, reports Locker. Fluoride's alleged beneficial effects
are topical; ingested fluoride causes fluorosis.
Dental fluorosis -- white
spotted, yellow or brown permanently stained and sometimes pitted teeth --
can only be hidden with expensive cosmetic dentistry not usually covered by
insurance.
Sodium fluoride and
silicofluorides are added to 62 percent of U.S. and 40 percent of Canadian
water supplies to mimic the natural calcium-fluoride community water sources
like that of the Southwest United States, where researchers, in the early
1900's, found an epidemic of brown-stained teeth that were curiously decay
resistant. They assumed that fluoride, which caused the stained teeth, was
the cavity fighting agent.
In the late 1940's,
officials started adding artificial fluoride to many U.S. drinking waters to
improve America's dental health. A 1981 survey hinted they were already on
the wrong track. This National Institutes of Health Survey reported that
cavities were still lowest in the Southwest region. Thirty years of
artificial fluoridation across the U.S. should have leveled off decay rates,
but that hasnít happened.
"We believe the calcium and
other well-known bone and teeth building minerals in the water and soils was
responsible for lower decay rates -- not the fluoride," says lawyer Paul
Beeber, resident, New York State Coalition Opposed to Fluoridation.
"Fluoridation is a huge dangerous mistake.î
According to Beeber,
silicofluorides were never tested for safety in humans or animals, either
alone or together with other water additives. "Astonishingly,
silicofluorides are the fertilizer industry's waste product and contain
trace amounts of contaminants such as arsenic, mercury, lead and more,î he
says.
Other findings from the
Canadian government report include:
-
Efforts are required to
reduce (fluoride) intake among the most vulnerable age groups, children
aged 7 months to 4 years..."
-
Data on the effect on
health and well-being of the relatively small decrease in caries rates in
children and adolescents currently achieved by water fluoridation is
non-existent.
-
Water fluoridation,
infant formulas, fluoride supplements and fluoride toothpaste are risk
factors of dental fluorosis. The simplest way of
reducing the prevalence of fluorosis in child populations is to cease to
fluoridate community water supplies.
Source: E-Dental 25
April 2001
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