Anti-fluoride campaigners don’t agree. Image credit: “Dental Care Tips for Mom and Baby” presentation
What’s the story about this new IQ-fluoride study? The one that claims fluoride intake by pregnant women could endanger their children’s IQ?
Whatever the truth, it has certainly got the anti-fluoride activists going. Mary O’Brien Byrne, leader of the local anti-fluoride group is even suggesting people check if their mothers lived in fluoridated areas. And they are busy promoting the newspaper articles on this. For example Fluoride exposure in utero linked to lower IQ in kids, study says, Children’s IQ could be lowered by mothers drinking tap water while pregnant, and Higher levels of fluoride in urine linked to lower IQ scores in children.
Best not rely on those media reports, though – you know how unreliable they can be. The original paper is available – this is the citation:
Bashash, M., Thomas, D., Hu, H., Martinez-mier, E. A., Sanchez, B. N., Basu, N., … Hernández-avila, M. (2016). Prenatal Fluoride Exposure and Cognitive Outcomes in Children at 4 and 6 – 12 Years of Age in Mexico. Environmental Health Perspectives, 1, 1–12.
And here is a link to the full text. Download it and see what sense you make of it. I warn you it is a difficult paper to read. A lot of information is lacking and the information that is included is hard to find. The statistical analysis is incomplete.
A new twist on the tired old fluoride/IQ story
Basically, it is the old drinking water fluoride causes lowering of IQ story. This time it relates to a supposed association of fluoride intake by pregnant mothers with cognitive deficits in their children. Interesting, only one other similar study (involving fluoride exposure while pregnant) has been reported – in January this year, and also in Mexico. I wrote about that study of Valdez Jiménez et al., (2017), In utero exposure to fluoride and cognitive development delay in infants, in the article Premature births a factor in cognitive deficits observed in areas of endemic fluorosis?
Briefly, the Valdez Jiménez et al., (2017) study was from Mexican areas of endemic fluorosis with very high fluoride concentrations in drinking water so the results are not applicable to areas where community water fluoridation is used. However, the high incidence of premature births, and low birthweights for the children, for mothers with high urinary fluoride levels does suggest that problems of birth in areas of endemic fluorosis could provide a biological mechanism to explain the IQ deficits. Rather than a direct chemical toxicity mechanism.
What about the Bashash, et al. (2017) paper?
Generally, the paper concludes that “higher prenatal fluoride exposure . . . .was associated with lower scores on tests of cognitive function in the offspring.”
So here are some concerns I have about the paper
1: An association is not evidence of, or proof for, causation. Yes, that is the normal and obvious qualification for such studies and authors tend to repeat it – even if they might still attempt to argue the case that it is evidence. A lot of confirmation bias goes on with these sort of correlational studies.
2: The information about the mothers is scant. My first question, given it was Mexico, was did they come from areas of endemic fluorosis? The women were recruited from three hospitals in Mexico city but this says nothing about their current or former residential areas. No information on drinking water fluoride is presented nor any biological assessment, such as dental fluorosis, given which could help estimate the role of endemic fluorosis.
3: Assessment of fluoride exposure relied completely on urine fluoride concentration measurements. With between one and three samples for each mother-child pair! (Of the total sampled there was only one sample for 217, two for 224 and three for 71 mothers). I believe that is completely inadequate for estimating exposure – especially as fluoride levels in urine vary markedly during the day and with diet. Besides the extremely low sample numbers, the World Health Organisation has warned that while urinary fluoride can be useful for monitoring populations “Urinary fluoride excretion is not suitable for predicting fluoride intake for individuals.” (see “Contemporary biological markers of exposure to fluoride”). They further warn that 24 hr collection is preferred to the spot sampling used in this study.
4: The statistical information presented is confusing – and insufficient to estimate how relevant the reported statistically significant associations are. I believe the best idea of the data can be gleaned from the following figures presented in the paper.
Figure 2 displays the data and association of maternal urinary fluoride (MUFcr) with a general cognitive index (CGI) for the 4 yr old offspring.
Figure 3A displays the data and association of maternal urinary fluoride (MUFcr) with IQ of the offspring at age 6 -12.
While linear regression analysis showed statistically significant associations of the CGI and IQ of offspring’s with maternal urinary fluoride levels the large scatter indicates these associations will explain only a small part of the variations observed. In such situations, reliance on p values can be misleading. As a reader, I would be more interested in the R2 values which indicate the amount of variation explained by the association.
I estimate the reported relationships with maternal urinary fluoride could explain no more than a few percent of the variation in the data. In this case, I would expect that other risk-modifying factors that explain the variation more completely could be found. And if these were included in the multiple regressions there may not be any observable relationship with urinary fluoride.
I discussed this issue more fully in my article Fluoridation not associated with ADHD – a myth put to rest which showed that a published relationship of ADHD with fluoridation extent disappeared completely when altitude was included as a risk-modifying factor. And that relationship showed less scatter of the data points than in the figures above.
5: The absence of any association of child IQ to child urine fluoride was also reported in this paper. This conflicts with other researchers working in areas of endemic fluorosis who have reported such associations. It could be that the urine fluoride measurements used in the present study were not suitable. But I am picking that the anti-fluoride campaigners will be very silent about that information, given the importance they give to other studies showing a relationship in their propaganda.
Conclusions
it is a very unsatisfying paper. I couldn’t determine if areas of endemic fluorosis were implicated – as they were for the Valdez Jiménez et al., (2017) study. Urinary fluoride is an inadequate measure of fluoride exposure – especially for individuals and spot samples – and its variability does not allow comparison with other studies and other regions. I couldn’t evaluate if the reported results were relevant to New Zealand which does not have any endemic fluorosis.
Finally, I believe aspects of the statistical analysis were inadequate. But on the positive side, I am pleased the authors did display the actual data in their figures. The information in those figures forced me to conclude that maternal urinary fluoride may not have the influence the authors suggest. If it does have an influence its contribution can only be minor and other more important risk-modifying factors will be involved.
Mind you – I am sure anti-fluoride campaigners will see it differently. They are currently heavily promoting the study and anti-fluoride guru Paul Connett sees it as the best thing since sliced bread. He has gone on record to say this means the end of community water fluoridation!
Update
I think the anti-fluoride people are aware of weaknesses in this study. The local Fluyodie Free NZ has put out a press release including a figure which they have doctored to remove the data points which show how little variation is explained. Compare their figure with the Fiugure 2 above.
Fluoride Free NZ doctors figure from paper to hide the scatter in data points showing how little of the variability the relationship explains
Open Parachute 
As anyone who follows the anti fluoride lot, knows, they will dine out for years on any paper that even hints at a reason to stop C.W.F
.It will be splashed across social media as if it came from the Mayo Clinic or some other quality source.
What the peers say about it is irrelevant. This will be another paper that fits the bill to scaremonger
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Ken: it appears that your email server has my emails blacklisted . .I’ll resend a bit later.
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Chuck
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FDA says “Do Not Swallow” fluoride toothpaste.
FDA has never approved swallowing fluoride with intent to prevent dental caries because the evidence of effectiveness is “incomplete.”
EPA reports about a quarter of children ingesting too much fluoride and they omit the fetus and infants.
NIEHS 2011 data shows more than 60% of adolescents have dental fluorosis.
Most of the 300 studies on fluoride’s neurotoxic effects consistently report harm.
Most developed countries and over 200 cities/water districts have rejected water fluoridation on ethical and/or scientific reasons.
National Toxicology Program (NTP) review of animal studies reports moderate evidence of fluoride’s neurotoxic effects.
With little or no benefit, mothers should not drink fluoridated water when pregnant or wanting to become pregnant.
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Bill, despite your position as Director of the Fluoride Action Network and the responsibility you have for the misleading promotion of the study mentioned in my article and the next one – Maternal urinary fluoride/IQ study – an update – (and the unethical distortion of a figure from that study) you seem unable to actually engage with the subject of this article.
Instead, you repeat the tired old arguments which have been discussed and refuted many times here and also by others.
Perhaps the intentional isolation imposed by your group means that you are just not used to a good faith engagement on these scientific issues.
Perhaps your widespread ban on people like me, prevention from commenting on any website or facebook page you control directly or indirectly, has prevented you from actually honing the skills of rational debate.
So, here is a question for you. Why doesn’t your organisation stop this imposed ban on people like me and allow honest and open discussion of this issue?
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Bill Osmunson. Really.
Your quote: “FDA says “Do Not Swallow” fluoride toothpaste.”
Response: You are lying. It’s not the FDA that says “Do not swallow.” It’s the toothpaste manufacturers themselves. Please show me the FDA quote that says this.
As any novice knows, toothpaste contains approximately 2000 times the concentration of fluoride as optimally fluoridated water. Why are you lying about this?
Your next quote: “FDA has never approved swallowing fluoride with intent to prevent dental caries because the evidence of effectiveness is “incomplete.””
Response: You are lying. The FDA has approved optimally fluoridated Bottled Water, over which it has jurisdiction (since bottled water is considered a “food.”) Please see the following link.
https://www.fda.gov/food/ingredientspackaginglabeling/labelingnutrition/ucm073602.htm
These are your first two statements, Bill. You are lying in each case. Shall I go on?
Please explain why you feel the need to lie to bolster your agenda.
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David, Please be professional.
In order to be FDA approved, fluoride toothpaste is, the FDA has to agree to the health claim based on efficacy, dosage, safety and label. In the case of fluoride toothpaste, the FDA permits variable wording, but requires the words, “Do Not Swallow.” Read the FDA Orange Book on Fluoride.
Yes, toothpaste is more concentrated than fluoridated water. The FDA’s concern is over a “pea size” amount and in other documentation, the FDA based the warning on 0.25 mg of fluoride, about 12 oz of fluoridated water.
Regarding fluoridated water, the FDA did not “approve” the fluoridated water. Congress passed a law which gives companies the right to “notify” the FDA of a health claim, based on the support of two (I believe it is more than one) other Federal agencies. The FDA was notified of the claim on bottled water, but there was no NDA review and approval process based on science.
Please get professional or I will no longer respond.
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David made the mistake of getting caught up with your diversions, Bill.
But how professional is it for you to comment on my article here without relating any of your comments to the article itself? To, instead, attempt a diversion with your old tired arguments?
As Director of FAN, you should be ethically obliged to respond to my point about the distortions you are propagating about the research. To produce a graphic which removes all the data points (the main information in the original figure) and is not the correct graph anyway. You presumably did not want to use the IQ graph becuase it implied no effect at lower concentrations.
And you refuse completely to respond to the fact that the observed relationship is extremely weak, explaining only 3 – 4 % of the variation in IQ values. Such a weak relationship would most likely disappear completely when a genuine risk-modifying factor is included in a multiple regression. As I showed for the paper of Malin and Till (and their relationship initially explained 20 – 30% of the variation in ADHD prevalence). See Fluoridation and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder – a critique of Malin and Till, British Dental Journal, In Press.
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Bill Osmunson.
Thank you for directing me the the FDA Orange Book. I did just as you suggested. The following paragraph is relevant to our discussion:
“Subpart C — Labeling
(ii) Gel or paste dosage form with a theoretical total fluorine concentration of 1,500 ppm identified in 355.10(b)(2). Adults and children 6 years of age and older: Brush teeth thoroughly, preferably after each meal or at least twice a day, or as directed by a dentist or doctor. Instruct children under 12 years of age in good brushing and rinsing habits (to minimize swallowing). Supervise children as necessary until capable of using without supervision. Children under 6 years of age: Do not use unless directed by a dentist or doctor.”
Despite the fact that none of this has anything to do with the post under which we are commenting, I am surprised to now discover that you are the Director of the Fluoride Action Network. I would think someone in your position would be more careful about making blatantly incorrect statements.
The FDA does not say “Do not swallow” toothpaste. It says, “minimize swallowing.” On that same page, and relevant to this, we see:
“(2) For all fluoride rinse and preventive treatment gel products. “Keep out of reach of children. [highlighted in bold type] If more than used for” (select appropriate word: “brushing” or “rinsing”) “is accidentally swallowed, get medical help or contact a Poison Control Center right away.” These warnings shall be used in place of the general warning statements required by 330.1(g) of this chapter.”
This is because, as you have explained earlier, toothpaste has a much higher concentration of fluoride than optimally fluoridated water. Toothpaste is not intended to be eaten.
To illustrate the point, giving a child one chewable aspirin to swallow would be safe. Letting a child eat an entire bottle of chewable aspirins would be harmful. That is why chewable aspirins are labeled with the words, “Keep out of reach of children.”
Nevertheless, nowhere does the FDA require the words “Do not swallow” to be printed on toothpaste. It would be impossible not to swallow some amount of toothpaste after brushing.
MORE RELEVANT TO OPTIMALLY FLUORIDATED WATER (around which this discussion should center) . . . Nowhere an a bottle of FDA regulated Fluoridated Bottled Water will you see the statements, “Do not swallow,” or, “Keep out of reach of children.”
Regarding FDA approval for ingested fluoride, this is your comment: “FDA has never approved swallowing fluoride with intent to prevent dental caries because the evidence of effectiveness is “incomplete.””
This is from the FDA webpage: ” . . the food eligible to bear the claim is bottled water meeting the standards of identity and quality set forth in 21 CFR 165.110, containing greater than 0.6 and up to 1.0 mg/L total fluoride, and meeting all general requirements for health claims . . ”
And what are those “general requirements?” As explained earlier on the same page: ” . . a health claim based on an authoritative statement from an appropriate scientific body of the United States Government or the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) or any of its subdivisions.”
The FDA considers an authoritative statement from one of these bodies “complete evidence of effectiveness.” Again, your statement was blatantly false. Be professional and admit it.
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Professional scientists attack the message, not the messenger.
Attacking the messenger is a clear indication of a lack of factual evidence to support the theory, or simply an arrogant bully.
I did not put out the graph, although I agree with the point.
You suggested I made a diversion. No. I am creating a global view for judgment. A microscopic view needs to be taken along with a macroscopic and total view. (And your comment about ADHD could be considered a diversion.)
As I understand your concept and math, I think Bashah and authors and peer reviewers would agree. Out of 100 IQ points, the evidence points to only about a 2.5 to 3 point or percentage reduction in IQ. Obviously, the weight of evidence is a judgment call. I am not a biostatistician. I rely first on the Food and Drug Administration for their approval of efficacy. FDA has denied approval for the ingestion of fluoride.
However, risk is a difficult concept to test. . . ethically. We can’t do RCT on risk to determine how much fluoride is needed to cause harm. Therefore, supporters approach the practice wanting a high degree of proof of harm (which is not possible ethically) and others, such as myself, are more cautious. We advocate a precautionary principle for the mass medication of everyone in a population without their consent. If you want to prescribe fluoride for your patients, as a doctor, I think you should be able to. However, I do not think that a group of non-scientists should legislate an unapproved substance on non-consenting adults without clear evidence of both safety and efficacy. Fluoride ingestion has neither.
The Bashah et al study is huge, but not definitive. All streams of evidence must be combined for judgment. The NTP reviewed animal studies and determined with a moderate degree of confidence that fluoride is a neurotoxicant. They are now reviewing human studies, and if the evidence from human studies reaches the level of “moderate,” then fluoride will be defined by the National Toxicology Program as a neurotoxicant (as have others such as Grandjean).
This is really the first significant USA (funded) study to even evaluate the neurotoxicity of fluoride. For 70 years proponents have assured the public fluoride is safe. Now with 300 studies (not high quality) on neurotoxicity and the vast majority agreeing with harm, the weight of evidence is a serious concern.
It is a judgment call, based on all streams of evidence.
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David,
I agree with the FDA and I think my statement is in keeping.
The claim of effectiveness of fluoridated bottled water did not go through the FDA NDA process. The FDA did not scientifically approve the ingestion of fluoride.
What is the NDA number for fluoridated bottled water? Please send that to me.
The FDA was “notified” of intent to make the health claim. The FDA did not do a scientific review of efficacy and safety with label at that time because they had done it previously and application was rejected.
“Keeping out of reach of children” is a different concept than “Do Not Swallow.”
With the toothpaste label, the FDA does permit variable wording.
Regarding the 0.25 mg, the a “pea” comes in various sizes. When I squeezed out 75 “pea size’ amounts of toothpaste from my small new tube of toothpaste, I calculated each had 0.5 mg of fluoride. When I testified to that effect to the Senators in the Oregon Legislation, one Senator asked Dr. Pollick (UCSF) how much of the toothpaste was a concern, how many milligrams was that. He testified it was 9.25 mg. In other words, my pea size of toothpaste was twice as large as it should have been. I then looked more, and the FDA document used (which I don’t have at my finger tips) said 025 mg is the amount of fluoride. Keep looking David, you are asking the right science questions.
I agree, it would be impossible to not swallow some toothpaste when brushing or have the fluoride absorbed in the mouth to some degree. One reason fluorosis has dramatically increased to over 60%, 26% moderate and 2% severe in the USA.
David, you said, ‘The FDA considers an authoritative statement from one of these bodies “complete evidence of effectiveness.” ‘
Remember, the evidence is not the FDA’s but rather Congress changing the law to require the FDA to permit the health claim. The FDA did not do the review. What is the NDA for fluoridated bottled water?
And, what about 0.25 mg fluoride supplements? The same 0.25 mg amount as 8 to 12 oz of fluoridated bottled water. The FDA has not approved the supplements at the same dosage.
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Bill Osmunson,
First of all, we have agreed that there is no Warning Label of any kind required for FDA Regulated Fluoridated Bottled Water. Fluoridated Bottled Water is Optimally Fluoridated Water. Water with 0.6 – 1.0 ppm F is the subject at hand. The issue is not toothpaste. The FDA does not require any warning label for its optimally fluoridated water. Do we agree on this?
That being said, you say, “I agree with the FDA and I think my statement is in keeping.”
Ok, let’s take a look at what you said. You said, “FDA has never approved swallowing fluoride with intent to prevent dental caries because the evidence of effectiveness is “incomplete.””
How exactly did you arrive at the conclusion that the FDA considers evidence of effectiveness incomplete? Please answer that question.
In fact, you put the word “incomplete” in quotation marks. You are telling us that the FDA has actually said this. Please show me any statement from any FDA webpage in which the FDA says the evidence of the effectiveness of fluoride is “incomplete.”
I stand by my original accusation. You are not being honest.
But to be clear, you are not saying that the FDA has never “approved swallowing fluoride.” You are simply saying that the FDA has never approved swallowing fluoride for the prevention of dental caries. Is that correct?
KEN: I apologize to you for what must seem like a diversion from the subject of your post, but as Bill Osmunson has said, he is, “creating a global view for judgment.” I would like to take a very close look at his macroscopic, total view . . and let’s see if it holds water.
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Bill O.,
For the record, so anyone in the future can freely quote you on this, you said:
“I agree, it would be impossible to not swallow some toothpaste when brushing or have the fluoride absorbed in the mouth to some degree. One reason fluorosis has dramatically increased to over 60%, 26% moderate and 2% severe in the USA.”
A reason for the increase of dental fluorosis in the U.S. is the swallowing of toothpaste. I agree, especially when you consider marketing tactics that have made children’s toothpaste more appealing. In the 1950s – the 1990s, flavored toothpaste catering to children’s tastes didn’t exist. There was no Bubble-Gum flavored toothpaste, or anything like that.
But you hadn’t considered that when you made your comment about the swallowing of toothpaste and dental fluorosis, did you.
Do you have any evidence that optimally fluoridated water is responsible for harmful degrees of dental fluorosis? A simple No will suffice.
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Bill, I think you should look at your comments on professional behaviour. It is surely unprofessional for you and your organisation to direct all your groups to prevent scientists from commenting on their pages. And let’s not get onto the personal attacks by these groups on people like me who are denied the right of reply. Is that not juvenile bullying?
However, You agree that the graphic promoted by your organisation omitted the most important information – the data? Then do something about it. Withdraw the figure and, if you must, replace it with the correct figure (fig 3A) and include the data. Let people see what you are basing your claims on.
No, I do not think you understand my point. The data simply doesn’t allow one to determine that there is a “2.5 to 3 point or percentage reduction in IQ” because the relationship presented explains so little of the variation – of the data. The correct “judgement call” is that this study cannot be used to make the claims you and your organisation make of it.
But again you are diverting. The study is not huge – except in your mind and your organisation’s propaganda. Just over 200 subjects, a relationship explaining only 3.6% of the variance in child IQ, the fact that no relationship was found with the children in the first 3 years, etc.
So your divert – despite the fact you come here to comment on an article related specifically to this study and its problems. Why comment here if you cannot come to grips with the study (admittedly the paper is very poorly written) and its critique? Why? Simply to attempt a diversion.
I do not think, considering your ideological bias, you are the appropriate person to make these “judgement calls” you talk about. It is surely straw clutching to talk about studies showing biological harm to people living in areas of endemic fluorosis as if they are relevant to community water fluoridation. There is no credible study showing any harm from the use of optimum levels of fluoride used in such schemes – in fact, quite the opposite. So you must rely completely on inappropriate studies to support your political message.
Biological harm to people living in areas of endemic fluorosis is a real concern as it affects millions of people. It is simply dishonest to use that concern and the research emanating from it in the political way you have.
This image, used in one of your conferences, does show the problems of endemic fluorosis – but we certainly don’t see those problems in New Zealand. None at all. It is unethical to use such evidence in the way you do.
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Yes, Dr. Osmunson.
First, did you actually use the image that Dr. Perrott has presented above in one of your conferences, whose sole intent was to argue against community water fluoridation?
And secondly, am I still “asking the right science questions?”
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That image was from a slide of Prof Xiang’s presentation to Paul Connett’s Fluoride Action Network conference in 2014.
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Fluoridated Bottled Water has never gone through the NDA approval process. So the label is not based on a review of the science by the FDA CDER.
Ken. The image of severe skeletal and dental fluorosis is not mine. I think I’ve seen it before and it could have been at a FAN conference.
I don’t use any image without data. I don’t control other people. This is not a kingdom like the ADA where everyone is supposed to stay in line. The decline in IQ is small regardless of the graph. But a small IQ difference, such as 1 mg/L F, halves the number of gifted and doubles the low IQ mentally challenged. Look at the graphs and compare the tales of the bell curve. More fluoride, fewer gifted, more mentally retarded.
The EPA bases their MCLG on minimizing severe skeletal fluorosis. EPA maintains there is no harm or risk to anything except severe dental fluorosis. National Research Council 2006 disagreed. Some people can experience harm at lower concentrations before they have severe reactions.
David, I appreciate you moving to a more professional tone. Thank you. Yes, you are asking good questions and there are many more. If I were to make a suggestion, it would be in regards to judgment. Carefully look at benefits, risks, total exposure and jurisdiction with the literature as a whole, not just one side.
The research on benefit is not good and mixed. If one is willing to accept the poor research on benefit, then the same quality of research as it relates to risk should be accepted. We must not have bias with a double standard.
At the last FAN conference, my only presentation, 15 minute minutes, was on some of the evidence from the FDA, JADA, EPA, NHANES 2000, 2011 and other publications which have found very little or no benefit. If there is little or no benefit, the cost and risks make fluoridation unacceptable.
Took me several years of careful evaluation before I changed my mind on water fluoridation. It also took getting to know some people with adverse effects. Some are so very sensitive to small amounts of fluoride such as fluoridated water, mechanically deboned meat, etc.
I have not denied anyone the right to comment in any place, even my office or home. And I do not control the people who are opposed or to or promote fluoridation. FAN is not a membership organization. Almost all are volunteers. We have two full time paid employees and I receive no compensation for anything from FAN. I pay my own transportation to meetings and pay my own lodging and food. FAN is a group of similarly minded people, several have been seriously harmed from fluoride, who find fluoridation is not ethical, too many are ingesting too much, the benefits are minimal if any, the risks have not been carefully studied and the literature is growing in opposition to fluoridation.
Judgment for me, required a careful evaluation of all aspects, not just a few studies.
When all put together, the best place to reduce excess exposure is to give people freedom to get fluoride from other sources and turn off the fluoride pumps.
I will admit the ethics is hard for me to swallow. When asked, most dentists and government scientists I’ve talked to agree, freedom of choice is a huge factor. No new substance or drug will be added to public water. Fluoridation could not start now based simply on ethics. Several countries have stopped or never started because of ethics. Even when I supported fluoridation, I had no good answer for those who wanted freedom of choice.
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Bill, the fact is your organisation FAN used the image without data – and the wrong image at that. You must take responsibility for what your organisation does – surely. Especially when it misrepresents both eh image and the conclusions.
In this case, the graphic distributed by FAN is completely misleading.
You seem to want to avoid this issue – which comes down to the scatter in the data. This relationship just cannot be used to estimate an effect – not because the effect is small but becuase the relationship is extremely poor as it explains only 3.6% of the variance. The only conclusion one can draw from the statistical analysis (and I showed that in Maternal urinary fluoride/IQ study – an update) is that one should look for a more credible risk-modifying factor. Maternal urinary F is not suitable – or at least, the poor sampling used in this study is not suitable.
Can you not understand the significance of the small R-squared value in the regression analysis? Can you not look at the graphs and see the extreme scattering?
It is disingenuous to claim that “National Research Council 2006 disagreed” with the conclusion that the main problem with fluoride is severe dental fluorosis. They, in fact, concluded that the contamination levels for fluoride should be reduced from 4 ppm to 2 ppm simply on the basis of the risk of severe dental fluorosis.
Yes, they reviewed the literature on all sorts of other effects – but did not find them significant enough at low concentrations to change their conclusions. Just because they recommended continued research does not mean they included those findings from high concentration studies in their final conclusions.
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My thoughts turn to other controversial issues such as CT in football, tobacco, global warming, statins, fluoride, etc. etc.
None of those have absolute proof of harm and each needs further study.
However, the evidence for each is predominantly going in one direction and thoughtful scientists not in the pocket of of vested interests feel the evidence is strong enough that more protection in football, less tobacco, cleaner air/water/fuel efficiency, alternatives to statins when possible, and reduce fluoride exposure, etc is the prudent direction to take.
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Wrong question.
Total exposure is the concern and question.
Fluoride in Foods, medications,pesticides, post-harvest fumigants, dental products water, and air must be included in dosage. No one lives in isolation with only one source.
Water is only part of total exposure
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Clearly, Bill, you do not want to discuss the Mexican urinary F paper, or at least do not understand it enough to discuss it. Which rather poses the question of why you should be commenting on this article of mine.
Perhaps then you could deal with my question about the way your organisation prevents discussion on Facebook pages and websites it controls.
Why should people like me be banned from input on scientific issues when they Are discussed. And what do you think of the childish bullying people like me are exposed to where your mates indulge in silly name calling, etc., without enabling any response.? Isn’t this cowardly and unprofessional?
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Dr. Osmunson, you say:
“If I were to make a suggestion, it would be in regards to judgment. Carefully look at benefits, risks, total exposure and jurisdiction with the literature as a whole, not just one side. . . . We must not have a bias or double standard.”
I have an simpler litmus test than that. I look at who is telling the truth. You have not been honest in this thread alone (and I really want to use the L word).
You said, ““FDA has never approved swallowing fluoride with intent to prevent dental caries because the evidence of effectiveness is “incomplete.””
That is not true. The FDA has never said “evidence of effectiveness” of the ingestion of fluoride is “incomplete.” If they did say that, prove me wrong and show me.
You begin your most recent response to me with: “Fluoridated Bottled Water has never gone through the NDA approval process. So the label is not based on a review of the science by the FDA CDER.”
Why would it? The FDA does not consider the fluoride (at that concentration) in its fluoridated bottled water to be a drug. This is a label from this FDA regulated product.
http://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/beverages/9231/2
You will not see the word “drug,” or the phrase “drug facts.” In fact, the New Zealand High Court has gone out of its way to say this. “Justice Collins concluded that when HFA and SSF are added to domestic water supplies at the maximum acceptable level (ie 1.5mg/L) HFA and SSF are not medicines for the purpose of the Act.”
In fact, no court of last resort in the United States has ever concluded that fluoride at the optimal level in water is not a drug or medicine. So the question stands . . Why would the FDA need to approve of anything as a drug, when the United States does not consider it a drug?
So what does the FDA call the fluoride in it’s regulated bottled water? You will see fluoride listed as a Mineral Nutrient on the link that I have provided.
On the bottle you will also see the health claim that optimally fluoridated water which says (paraphrased) ‘drinking optimally fluoridated water may help to reduce the incidence of dental caries.’
You will NOT see the phrase that is often seen on supplements: “These claims have not been evaluated by the FDA,” because this claim WAS evaluated by the FDA and found to be valid by its own criteria.
Now, you are trying to trivialize the importance of the FDA approved health claim on bottled water. You say: “Congress passed a law which gives companies the right to “notify” the FDA of a health claim, based on the support of two (I believe it is more than one) other Federal agencies.”
Is this achievement the small task you are trying to imply? Hardly. If it was, you would not see this necessary disclaimer (These statements have not been evaluated by the FDA.) on an expensive bottle of “snake-oil” Prevagen. In fact, every health supplement has to include this disclaimer as part of its labeling.
But not so with optimally fluoridated water.
And let’s be honest, shall we? The only reason you brought up the FDA in the first place, is because the FDA has no jurisdiction over Community Water Fluoridation — As You Well Know. The only reason I am talking about fluoridated bottled water, is because that is the exception.
I look at who’s telling the truth. Since you brought up the FDA, I had a long discussion with a fellow named Sauerheber, (I’m sure you know him) who tried to argue that no governmental agency was in charge of Community Water Fluoridation. He argued that a 1979 Memorandum of Understanding between the EPA and the FDA had been dissolved in the 1980s. As proof of this alleged dissolution, he offered a document which was in reality the EPA outsourcing some of its responsibilities to NSF.
Sauerheber was either not telling the truth, or he had never read his own document.
Earlier in this thread, you said, “I don’t use any image without data.” And I assume you don’t say anything without real data either, right?
This is what you said, “ It also took getting to know some people with adverse effects. Some are so very sensitive to small amounts of fluoride such as fluoridated water, . . “ Well, who are these people? You have a list of some of these “victims” on your webpage. Among them is one Karen Spencer who claims to have fluoride sensitivity. Her claims are extraordinary. She claims to need a water filter to save herself from a plethora of ailments.
What I find extraordinary about Ms. Spencer is the fact that, until it was pointed out to her, her Facebook page showed her frolicking in the ocean at the shore. She seemed quite happy and healthy to me. The odd thing is that the ocean has twice the concentration of fluoride as optimally fluoridated water. She wasn’t drinking it, of course, she was breathing the ocean spray. Just as sea-spray has salt in it, it would also have fluoride in it. You must know that atmospheric fluoride, when breathed in, is one source of fluoride exposure. It would have been entering her bloodstream, simply by enjoying herself by the ocean.
Even more extraordinary is the fact that Ms. Spencer claims her local municipality has poisoned her entire family, and intentionally made them sick. Where’s the lawsuit? The United States, the land of the class action lawsuit, is so full of lawsuits that McDonald’s was successfully sued because its coffee was too hot!! But nothing from Ms. Spencer. That is odd, isn’t it. — But of course you believe her because it fits your agenda.
I pay attention to who is telling the truth.
One of your most avid commenters, who hides behind a fake name, claimed that CWF killed salmon. As evidence he presented a video from a “local environmentalist” named Patterson. The truth? An industrial accident in which an aluminum plant dumped too much fluoride into a river . . . had nothing to do with CWF.
This isn’t about shooting the messenger. Dr. Perrott will be the first one to tell you that I disagree with him on a wide variety of issues. It’s about the honesty of the messengers. And you people do not tell the truth.
In a personal email to me, even your esteemed Dr. Connett admitted that he has a tendency to exaggerate the truth. I would be happy to produce the email upon request.
And since you brought up the FDA, its approval is of such importance to you, isn’t it strange that one of your own donors, Mercola, which happens to sell anti-fluoride / natural health / water purification products (the sales of which could only increase from the generation of paranoia about safe tap water that your organization spews) has had its own ethics problems with the FDA. Isn’t that correct?
It’s about who is lying. Your side, and even you yourself, has been caught in dishonest statements more times than I can count.
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David,
I used to be a “believer” in other people. Now I look at the science rather than at the person. Message rather than messenger.
If a person “believes” trusts and has faith in an organization, they will be let down.
You again call me a liar, because the information I presented does not fit within your “box.”
I’m not going to spend the time to look up the exact quote from the FDA, but they do say the evidence of effectiveness is “incomplete.”
If the evidence of effectiveness were adequate, the FDA CDER would have approved the ingestion of fluoride with the intent to prevent caries. Why have they denied approval? David, you tell me why the FDA CDER has denied approval.
You see, the FDA requires quality research on effectiveness at a dosage and then they determine whether the manufacturer’s research demonstrates safety at that dosage.
Fluoride research fails in all counts.
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Ken, (David, your post is so long I will work on it later.)
I have been discussing the paper by Bashah et a;. I presume what you call the Mexican paper, from a macro perspective. Remember, the authors are from Canada, USA and Mexico. We should call this a North American paper. The authors have a reasonably strong background in research from several Universities.
1Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
2University of Michigan School of Public Health, Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA
3Indiana University School of Dentistry, Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis, Indianapolis, Indiana, USA
4Faculty of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada
5Center for Human Growth and Development, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA
6Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
7Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, New York, USA
8Instituto Nacional de Perinatología, Mexico City, Mexico
9Instituto Nacional de Salud Pública, Cuernavaca, Morelos, Mexico
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Ken,
The list of authors and backgrounds with NIH funding, should be reasonably acceptable to you.
Do we agree with the Authors when they state,
”
: Few of the epidemiologic studies have been longitudinal, had individual measures of fluoride exposure, addressed the impact of prenatal exposures or involved more than 100 participants.”
Would you agree an epidemiological longitudinal study of measured fluoride exposure is one of the highest quality types of human studies we can ethically do on risk?
70 years of giving people fluoride without their consent and we have failed miserably to have reasonable studies on safety. Shame on our professions for not speaking up demanding quality studies on benefit and risk.
The Broadbent et al study out of NZ recently is an example of very poor quality. Comparing water fluoridation with a control (most on fluoride supplements) and then claiming no evidence of lower IQ. The study actually compared fluoridated water with fluoride supplements and to no one’s surprise, found no adverse effect.
Reminds me of the Harvard study comparing two cancers and fluoride bone concentration. No significant difference and the conclusion fluoride does not cause bone cancer. How lame can researchers be, when the bone fluoride cancer concentrations were about double the normal similar age population.
More later.
Bill
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Bill, you are wrong – you have not discussed this paper at all. In fact, in this comment, you are relying only on “standing” rather than the content of the paper – and even then you ignore the fact that Thomas’s work on IQ was not included or even referred to – yet she was part of the team. (The paper only refers to her work in measurement of urinary F and she is not included in the authors list – I wonder why). You seem to argue on the basis of politics (perhaps that is what impresses you) – not science.
But it would be very nice if you did discuss the paper – it is after all the subject of my article where you are commenting.
But the impression I get is you do not understand it. You seem completely unwilling to discuss it. (No providing a list of authors is not a discussion of the paper).
So yet another diversion – you simply can not justify the way your organisation has dictated a ban on scientific people like me commenting on pages and websites you control in the US and New Zealand.
Science is the last thing that interests you guys – you must distort it and suppress it wherever you can.
And it does seem to put you personally in a rather undignified position – attempting to take advantage of, even divert, an honest good faith discussion here while preventing it wherever you can exert control.
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Bill, you are being political. My assessment of the science does not depend on the author’s political position in the science hierarchy. Jonathon Broadbent is a person of high standing and well-respected and funded. But my assessment of his work depends on that work – not his personal position. And in my assessment of Jonathan’s work I have made the inevitable comment on restrictions due to sample size -a restriction Jonathon would no doubt agree with seeing how agrees that the recent Swedish work involves much larger sample sizes but still produces the same result Broadbent found.
Why is it that you can make a critique of Jonathon’s work (a misinformed critique by the way because it ignores the way that fluoride pills were included as one of the factors in the statistical analysis and found not to have an influence) but want to completely ignore the scientific faults in the Mexican work. I have actually referred to them here – in this article – which you are commenting on! Did you not read it? I have also discussed them further and applied my own statistical analysis in the next article – Maternal urinary fluoride/IQ study – an update.
There are a number of faults in that work – what about discussing them – or do you agree with me about the flaws?
You guys did the same with the Malin and Till ADHD paper – and look how that turned out.
Try to get beyond the politics and names and look at the reported science.
Things are very bad indeed when you must justify scientific work by using the political standing and self-aggrandising statements of the authours.
Very bad.
It starts to look like an acknowledgement that you agree the science is faulty.
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Bill Osmunsun,
You say, “If the evidence of effectiveness were adequate, the FDA CDER would have approved ingestion of fluoride with the intent to prevent caries. Why have they denied approval? David, you tell me why the FDA CDER has denied approval?”
I already answered your question. They have not “denied approval.” You are once again being dishonest. I suggest you re-read my comment.
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Ken,
Every research has limitations. I started out with some strengths and there are many more.
You are so rabid against papers finding harm from fluoride and defensive of those not reporting harm. What is your connection with fluoride? Do you have a vested interest in the phosphate industry or fluoride?
Regarding Broadbent. A simple reading shows over 100 kids on fluoride supplements and fewer than 100 (I believe it was 99) not on fluoridated water. Are you telling me that most of the kids on supplements were also on fluoridated water? I don’t believe it. Even if it was 50/50, the power of the study would have made it not significant.
Ken, you think I control FAN. I’m a dentist, full time, clinical practice. FAN pays me nothing. I do not control FAN. But I question your objectivity and you go in circles and in tangents.
I only drop a note or two on a few misconceptions between patients.
More later.
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David,
Semantics?
If the FDA approves a substance to be marketed with a claim to prevent disease, the FDA gives it a NDA number.
Question David, How do you know the FDA has not denied approval. I contacted them and FDA responded answering my questions.
Question David, What is the NDA number for fluoride supplements or fluoride water or fluoride in any form marketed with the intent to prevent disease? Look it up in the Red Book.
I have only received one FDA device approval. The process was educational and I felt the FDA was fair, strict, and reasonable. Have you worked through the FDA approval process for any drugs or devices?
And cut the “honest vs dishonest” allegations.
Are you God? In other words, you have a box of knowledge and if the concept isn’t in your box you say the person is lying, dishonest. Consider that possibly you don’t have all knowledge in all subjects. Some humility would be professional.
I remember my mentor reminding me that 50% of what they taught me in dental school was wrong, they did not know which 50%. In other words, we must always question what we do, policy and practices. Humility is a virtue in science.
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Bill, you are director of FAN – that is why I considered you capable of discussing the distortions and misrepresentation in the image you organisation has promoted. I interpret your refusal to engage on this as an admission thta you know the distortions are wrong, are unprepared to defend them for ethical reasons, and just want to divert attention.
But, enough of the ad hominem attacks. I am a scientist simply critiquing the science and statistics in the paper I discuss in this article. I have done similar critiques of ideas in evolution/creationism and in climate change discussions. I do not have an agenda except to oppose the distortions and misrepresentation of science. It’s a retirement hobby of mine.
I could similarly ask you what your financial and ideological interests are in supporting such distortion and misrepresentation but prefer to actually challenge you on the science and to discuss the science.
As I said, regarding Broadbent’s paper, the numbers do place a limitation on the power of the analysis – and that conclusion can be drawn from the statistical analysis. But nevertheless, the analysis did show no effect for fluoride, despite showing positive effects for breastfeeding. But, as I said, Broadbent acknowledges this (and it plagues almost all other studies on IQ and fluoride). The large Swedish study of Aggeborn & Öhman (2016) made the same criticism of these studies and my impression is Broadbent agrees with this. He has actually suggested that the Swedish study is a better one to use for showing the nil effect. See Large Swedish study finds no effect of fluoride on IQ. I also cover this in the draft of my article which your mate Bruce Spittle, the editor of Fluoride, refused to allow published in his journal (but is currently being reviewed elsewhere) – CRITIQUE OF A RISK ANALYSIS AIMED AT ESTABLISHING A SAFE DAILY DOSE OF FLUORIDE FOR CHILDREN. Another ethical transgression as it critiqued a paper published in his journal.
But, I repeat, you are prepared to make a minor criticism of the science (you haven’t mentioned the statistics) in the Broadbent study but steer away completely from my critique of the science and statistics of the paper I discuss in this article.
I am not going around in circles or off at a tangent. I am attempting to bring you back to discussing my article. Why else would you comment here but to engage in discussion over my article? or is it simply an attempt at a cynical diversion?
I normally welcome discussions of my articles – it gives me a chance to assess if I have made mistakes. I can only conclude from your refusal to engage that you actually cannot find anything in my article to critique.
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See Ken. You just made a prime example of why you would be a problem participating in objective reasoning. Derogatory unprofessional comments create wars, not understanding.
Back to the Bashah study. A small increase in urine fluoride concentration in mother’s urine was found to decrease IQ in the fetus. The urine concentrations are similar to urine concentrations reported by the NRC 2006 report.
As with ALL studies, there are limitations and questions such as altitude. At a minimum, high altitude cities like Colorado Springs should be more cautious.
There are many unknowns and like tobacco which took 50 years for society to agree with the science, 70 years agree with hand washing, and global warming, all are still controversial with many people.
Freedom of choice is a critical issue. What about those people who have serious pain when exposed to even small amounts of fluoride? Should they not have our consideration?
What about the studies showing lack of benefit from ingesting fluoride and the lack of quality studies reporting benefit? And lack of FDA approval? With little or no benefit, any risk is unreasonable.
The hardest part of the fluoridation controversy for me to accept was lack of significant benefit from ingesting fluoride. I was so sure I could see the benefit.
This website has really gotten slow. Can ‘t keep up with typing.
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Ken, you are so frustratingly biased. Such a hostile communicator. You assume I agree with you when I have clearly said otherwise. You twist intent to fit your bias. No wonder people don’t want you on their web sites and discussion sites.
If you want me to pick you apart, what good would that do? I mean, lets start out at the beginning. Get the date correct when you reference the study. You want me to pick you apart, what good would that do? I did not raise your error, because I want to understand what you are saying rather than fight. You are a bully. You want to fight rather than learn. Your bias is so powerful you can’t reasonably judge the evidence on both sides of the issue. You sound like you worked for the tobacco companies.
In my dental school pathology course, 1975, almost every disease presented included the statement, “tobacco smoking increases this disease.” Yet it took years before the tobacco companies admitted their product caused harm. Global warming the same. 1970 my chemistry professor raised concerns with CO2 as a green house gas and we needed to reduce pollution.
And many still do not think we have “proof.” Judgment needs to be made, weighing all streams of evidence on all sides. And evidence is usually mixed. Judgment is required. Judgment in a calm, open unbiased quiet of our own minds.
Judgment and reason, like love, cannot be forced. They come from streams of evidence, not defensive hostility.
Do you want to reason together or fight? I’m not interested in fighting.
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Dr. Osmunson,
Let’s put your little con game to bed once and for all.
Bill O.: “Question David, How do you know the FDA has not denied approval. I contacted them and FDA responded answering my questions.”
Answer: 1.) I know that the FDA has not denied approval of optimally fluoridated water as it is distributed in Community Water Fluoridation because the FDA has nothing to do with CWF.
2.) I know that the FDA has not denied approval of optimally fluoridated water as it is distributed in bottled water because optimally fluoridated bottled water is considered a “food” by the FDA which has received approval.
I know that the FDA has not denied approval of the drug or medicine optimally fluoridated water because the FDA does not consider any component of optimally fluoridated water a drug or medicine. Therefore, since optimally fluoridated water is neither a drug nor a medicine, it can neither be denied nor approved as such.
Feel free to prove me wrong. Please show me anything on any U.S. government website, whether it be the website of the CDC . . . the FDA . . . the USDPH . . . the EPA . . .anything . . Show me any place where any legitimate body of the U.S. government considers optimally fluoridated water a drug or a medicine.
Bill O.: “Question David, What is the NDA number for fluoride supplements or fluoride water or fluoride in any form marketed with the intent to prevent disease?”
Response: This question surrounding optimally fluoridated water has already been answered. Anything beyond the discussion of optimally fluoridated water, whether it be toothpaste . . . pills . . . or injections . . . is a diversion on your part.
Bill O.: “And cut the “honest vs dishonest” allegations.
Are you God? In other words, you have a box of knowledge and if the concept isn’t in your box you say the person is lying, dishonest.”
Response: When caught making dishonest statements, you resort to hiding behind a cloud of relativism. That is what I would have expected. There is such a thing as telling the truth, and there is such a thing as not telling the truth.
If somebody says CWF kills salmon, and then talks about an accident at an aluminum plant to prove it, that is dishonest. If somebody says drinking optimally fluoridated water, or fluoride in general, can cause cancer, and fluoride is not on the World Health Organization’s list of known and probable carcinogens, that is dishonest. The amount of dishonesty from the anti-fluoride side is staggering.
You said, “ FDA has never approved swallowing fluoride with intent to prevent dental caries because the evidence of effectiveness is “incomplete.”
This is four times I am asking you for any evidence that the FDA has ever said the evidence of the effectiveness of the ingestion of fluoride is “incomplete.”
Your first response was, “I’m not going to spend the time to look up the exact quote from the FDA, but they do say the evidence of effectiveness is “incomplete.”” . . . . . Now you say, “I contacted them and FDA responded answering my questions.” . . . And yet no evidence to support comment. That is odd isn’t it.
There is such a thing as telling the truth. The discipline of science demands absolute adherence to the truth. Your side is lacking those values.
“If I sometimes I have a tendency to overstate – then my co-authors did their level best to counteract that by understating everything.” — Paul Connett, 10/12/2014
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Bill, this is silly. I ask you why FAN and its associates, including in NZ, refuse to allow participation of scientists like me in their discussion forum, and you respond with:
where the hell is the rationality in that?
And yet you are able to participate in the discussion here and hypocritically take advantage of this knowing your organisation will not allow a similar discussion in your own fora!
The fact is I specifically do not indulge in “Derogatory unprofessional comments” but try to deal with the evidence as I have in my article. In contrast, I actually get a lot of that silliness from your people who cowardly take advantage of a situation where I have no right of reply.
You claim ” A small increase in urine fluoride concentration in mother’s urine was found to decrease IQ in the fetus.” But that is just not the case. They reported an ASSOCIATION (not a cause) of maternal urinary F with IQ in 6-12 year offspring and GCI in 4-year offspring. The did not find any association for children of ages 1-3 years (reported by their colleague Thomas in her thesis but ignored in the paper’s discussion. Similarly, they glossed over Thomas’s reported positive relationship for 6-15-year-old males and simply reported the lack of a relationship when genders were combined.
This is one of the problems with the sort of misrepresentation and distortions your people indulge in. You confuse a reported ASSOCIATION with cause – ignoring the continued and necessary qualification of authors of these papers that correlation is not causation.
You concede that all studies have limitations. Yet refuse to engage with the obvious limitation which your organisation hides in its misrepresentation of the figure – the high scatter of the data. You refuse to engage with the fact that comes out of the statistical analysis that the reported association can explain only 3-4% of the scatter and the obvious implication that if a genuine risk-modifying g=factor was included in the statistical analysis the association with urinary F would disappear completely.
At best this study shows an extremely minor relationship which could be explored further (most probably by proper testing of the sort I did with the relationship reported by Malin and Till for ADHD). But no sensible professional in the field would respond the way that your mate Paul Connett has in claiming it means the end of fluoridation world wide. That is simply silly and just illustrates why he is not taken seriously by sensible authorities. It’s not the first time he has said things like this. People are starting to compare him to the religious nutters who regularly report the end of the world in a weeks time.
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No, Bill. I do not want to fight. I do not want you to “pick me apart.” I simply want you to engage with the evidence. To participate in a good faith scientific discussion of the sort that leads to improved knowledge. That is why I provide the opportunity for readers to comment on my articles.
I learn from these discussions and I believe people who refuse to honestly participate in them, who divert or ban them, simply do not learn.
So how do you respond to the fact coming out of the statistical analysis that the reported association can explain no more than 3 – 4% of the variance in cognitive measurements? Do you agree that is an output from the analysis? Do you agree that would be a simple eyeball conclusion from looking at the scatter in the figures? That, in fact, the scatter is vital information that should not have been deleted from the figures distributed by FAN?
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I would like to share a few thoughts / reflections about my recent discussion with Dr. Bill Osmunson, whom I discovered partway into the conversation, is the Director of the Fluoride Action Network.
First of all, I’ve never met the man. I have respect for his abilities, and he seems like a genuinely nice guy. However, in my opinion, I found him to be deceptive. The question for me (and for anyone who may be interested) . . . Is he knowingly deceptive, or is he simply biased to the point that he believes everything he is saying? . . In the end, I accused his arguments of being nothing more than a con game. That was the conclusion I reached and I can explain why.
He posted a comment under Dr. Ken Perrott’s post, “Fluoride, pregnancy and the IQ of offspring” which had nothing to do with the subject of the post; consequently, Dr. Perrott accused him of diverting from the main issue.
His defense was interesting, to say the least: “No. I am creating a global view for judgment. A microscopic view needs to be taken along with a macroscopic and total view.”
Prior to this, I had already taken issue with the first two comments that he had presented in his global view:
“FDA says “Do Not Swallow” fluoride toothpaste.
FDA has never approved swallowing fluoride with intent to prevent dental caries because the evidence of effectiveness is “incomplete.””
Admittedly, I can be abrasive. (I consider it honesty.) I accused him of lying. He defended himself with, “the FDA permits variable wording, but requires the words, “Do Not Swallow.” Read the FDA Orange Book on Fluoride.”
When I actually looked at the FDA Orange Book, found him to be incorrect and provided the actual paragraph, rather than acknowledging the error, he simply said, “With the toothpaste label, the FDA does permit variable wording.”
Ok. . . . I would have accepted an acknowledgement of the error (if it was a simple mistake), after all, we are all only human. But Dr. Osmunson chose to bury / ignore the mistake and move on.
I strongly felt that his second comment was a blatant lie. (Osmunson: “FDA has never approved swallowing fluoride with intent to prevent dental caries because the evidence of effectiveness is “incomplete.””) I did not believe that the FDA had ever said ‘the evidence of the effectiveness of the ingestion of fluoride is incomplete. . . . And I asked him several times to produce something from the FDA which confirmed this. . . which he was never able to do.
Since he had brought up the FDA, I raised the issue of “Fluoridated Bottled Water,” the only optimally fluoridated water over which the FDA has jurisdiction. (since the EPA oversees CWF).
I believe Dr. Osmunson was trying to pull a “fast one,” . . a con job. This is why I believe he is knowingly dishonest. (Again, it’s only my opinion):
Osmunson: “The claim of effectiveness of fluoridated bottled water did not go through the FDA NDA process. The FDA did not scientifically approve the ingestion of fluoride.” . . . and
“If the evidence of effectiveness were adequate, the FDA CDER would have approved the ingestion of fluoride with the intent to prevent caries. Why have they denied approval? David, you tell me why the FDA CDER has denied approval.”
The FDA never denied approval of its optimally fluoridated water. . . The problem with what he just said is that he is implying that bottlers of optimally fluoridated water tried, but failed, to get FDA approval of its bottled water, because there is something incomplete about the science.
It’s a con. The FDA neither denied, nor approved it’s fluoridated bottled water because the FDA does not consider fluoridated bottled water a “drug.” It is considered a food. What Dr. Osmunson just did is he purposely called optimally fluoridated water a “drug,” (and he tip-toed around it) so that he could say that it has never been approved as a drug. Neither the FDA, nor the CDC, nor the USDPH, nor any agency calls water with 0.6 – 1.0 ppm F a “drug” or a “medicine.”
How can something be approved as a drug or medicine, when it is not considered a drug or a medicine?
And he is doing it in this comment under another post (timestamped Sept. 29, 4:24 am): “Why are we not seeing many studies out of the USA, NZ, AU, Canada where governments add fluoride to water without the patient’s consent?”
What patients? Does he mean consumers of optimally fluoridated water? This is nonsense. A town near my home has a natural fluoride level of 1.0 ppm. Are the people who drink that water also “patients?” And if so . . I guess that would make either God, or Nature, the doctor. He is trying to con his followers by redefining something that has already been defined.
Nevertheless, I still invite Dr. Osmunson to show me anything from the FDA which says the science behind the effectiveness of the ingestion of fluoride is incomplete.
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David,
The old debate strategy, attack the messenger rather than the message.
The amount of information is too vast to put into a single short post which your attention span seems to miss.
I started you out with the Orange Book. You listened. Thank you and looked it up. Then I said go to the FDA Red Book. Which it does not appear you have.
Then I would send you to the NDA application process and guidance documents. The FDA is clear on drug approval. All drugs require approval or they are considered “illegal.” Yes, the FDA says there are thousands of illegal drugs, substances marketed without FDA approval. All this can be found on the FDA web pages along with their letters and articles to the state Boards of Pharmacy.
I would then send you directly to the FDA with specific questions for an FOIA request. One step at a time.
We must start simple and slowly add to the information. It was easier to call me a liar than to look at the evidence.
There is no NDA for the ingestion of fluoride with intent to prevent dental disease. Why? Applications have been made but no NDA has been approved.
Let me once again repeat a quote from Drug Therapy 1975 when the FDA sent letters to many (I think it was 35) fluoride drug manufacturers,
“. . .there is no substantial evidence of drug effectiveness as prescribed, recommended or suggested in its labeling. . . marketing is in violation of the new drug provisions of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act; they have, therefore, requested that marketing of these products be discontinued.” FDA Letter to 35 Companies DRUG THERAPY 1975
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David,
When a manufacturer (city/water district) combines chemicals together with a health claim, they are the final manufacturer of the drug (as defined by the FD&C Act). The people taking that drug are the intended patients being treated. The intent of adding is for health purposes.
You suggest a town near you has natural fluoride at 1.0ppm. Yes, and water can have many times more, 15 ppm+. That is why much of the early research is on existing levels of fluoride, to attempt to answer your question and concern, how much fluoride in water is OK/safe.
At what concentration of fluoride in water is it not safe? Of course that also depends on all sources of fluoride. WHO recommends first determining the total fluoride exposure.
EPA says 4.0 ppm. We have many human studies, I have posted a few on the other blog, which showed harm below 4.0 ppm The NRC 2006 said 4.0 ppm is not protective. FAN went to court and won on all counts, EPA’s review of HF for post-harvest fumigants, their lack of safety studies, was not protective. Congress over road the court decision.
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Well this is rich, Dr. Osmunson. I am glad to see that you have a sense of humor.
1st: “The old debate strategy. Attack the messenger, rather than the message.” . . then . .
2nd: “The amount of information is too vast to put into a single short post which your attention span seems to miss.”
Thank you for providing a great example of your first comment.
And thank you for proving my point that you are little more than a con artist: “The FDA is clear on drug approval. All drugs require approval or they are considered “illegal.”’
AGAIN — Optimally fluoridated water is not a drug. I openly invite you to show me any statement from any U.S. Healthl Agency which says otherwise. Please . . . I am begging you . . . Prove me wrong.
This seems very strange:
“There is no NDA for the ingestion of fluoride to prevent dental disease. Why? Applications have been made but no NDA has been approved.”
Really? Then please provide the NDA number of FDA regulated optimally fluoridated water. Please give me the NDA (New Drug Application) for fluoride drops. If the application was made for optimally fluoridated water – as you suggest – then what is the NDA number for that application?
While you’re at it, could you please provide the NDA number for Aspirin or Tylenol, since these, like fluoride drops were grandfathered in prior to FDA rules mandating drug testing, just as were fluoride drops.
I admit it, I was wrong. I have little respect for your abilities, which include the art of bullshit, and I do not genuinely believe you are a nice guy. I believe you are a shill for Mercola’s bottom line. How were their donations last year?
Cheers.
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Dr. Osmunson, you have said, ” But some are harmed with much lower concentrations and more sensitive adverse effects.” (“Endemic fluorosis and its health effects” Time-stamped September 29, 2017 3:13 am)
Who? . . What harm? . . At what concentration? Since the subject is optimally fluoridated water, please cite one documented case in which any human being on the face of the Earth has ever been harmed in any way by drinking optimally fluoridated water . . even for as much as a lifetime.
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Bill Osmunson: “When a manufacturer (city/water district) combines chemicals together with a health claim, they are the final manufacturer of the drug (as defined by the FD&C Act). The people taking that drug are the intended patients being treated. The intent of adding is for health purposes.”
Nevertheless, the FDA does not consider optimally fluoridated water a drug. If I am wrong, please provide anything from the FDA which disproves this. This is the second time I am asking this.
This is the 5th time I am asking you for any evidence that the FDA has ever said the evidence of the effectiveness of the ingestion of fluoride is “incomplete,” as you have claimed.
You’re not very good at defending your bogus claims, are you.
How much did Mercola give you guys last year? (This is the second time I am asking this.) And, I guess I could look it up, but I’m sure you know . . how much does a tube of Mercola’s anti-fluoride toothpaste go for now?
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David,
It is not possible for me to do all your home work for you. You will understand the issues better if you do the digging. I will not respond in total in one post. It would be too long.
You have failed to respond to the synopsis of 10 research articles I posted which found a decrease in IQ with fluoride exposure.
Here is some on fluoride as a drug.
The FDA testified to congress that fluoride is a drug.
The definition of a drug is based on intent of use.
“37-128.Sale of new drugs — Regulations and procedures. (a) No person shall sell, deliver, offer for sale, hold for sale or give away any new drug unless (1) an application with respect thereto has become effective under section 505 of the federal act,”
“SEC. 505. [21 USC §355] New Drugs “(a) Necessity of effective approval of application. No person shall introduce or deliver for introduction into interstate commerce any new drug, unless an approval of an application filed pursuant to subsection (b) or (j) is effective with respect to such drug.”
Here is some of the Washington State laws and some comments:
Fluoride, dispensed as sodium fluoride and hyrofluorosilicic acid, have similar toxicity to strychnine, cyanide, arsenic, lead and other highly toxic substances, lethal at less than 50 mg/Kg body weight. 5 mg/Kg of fluoride is considered lethal for humans and animals. As little as 15 mg is considered lethal for some children.
“RCW 69.38.010 “Poison” defined. As used in this chapter “poison” means:
(1) Arsenic and its preparations; (2) Cyanide and its preparations, including hydrocyanic acid; (3) Strychnine; and (4) Any other substance designated by the state board of pharmacy which, when introduced into the human body in quantities of sixty grains or less, causes violent sickness or death.” http://apps.leg.wa.gov/RCW/default.aspx?cite=69.38.010
60 grains is 3,889 mg, far less than the 15 mg considered lethal for some children. Fluoride substances dispensed into community water systems are poisons as defined by RCW 69.38.010. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) defines a poison to be a substance when less than 50 mg/Kg of body weight is ingested and will cause death within two weeks. Containers of raw fluoridation products are consistent with laws, displaying skull, crossbones, and the word “poison”.
Artificial fluoridation chemicals are classified as a hazardous waste by the US EPA and Environment Canada. As such they may not be put directly into the lakes, rivers, or oceans. The chemicals put into community water which goes into lakes, rivers, and oceans contain between 20 to 30% hydrofluorosilicic acid (inorganic fluoride), trace amounts of arsenic, lead, mercury, radionuclides and other heavy metals (AWWA B703-06) certainly not pharmaceutical grade, nor do they follow Best Manufacturing Practices (US Congressional Hearings 1999-2000.
Artificial fluoridation chemicals are designated hazardous waste by the Basel Convention, the most comprehensive global environmental agreement on hazardous and other wastes, signed by 170 countries. See Annex III Class 6.1 Code H6.1 and Annex I Y32.
Natural occurring fluoride levels are frequently about 0.3 ppm. Assuming artificial fluoridation adds 0.7 ppm, about 1,000,000 pounds/million people/year of fluoridation chemicals are put into community water with virtually all returning to the streams, rivers and lakes.
Toxic substances in artificial fluoridation products, such as arsenic, lead, beryllium, vanadium, cadmium, mercury, radium, radionuclides are toxic, persistent, bioaccumulative, anthropogenic. They are listed under the 1989 First Priority Substances lists in Canada and proposed for virtual elimination under the Canadian Environmental Protection Act (CEPA 1999, 2006 update), the 1997 Binational Toxic Strategy and the 1978 Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement.
RCW 69.38.010 has been in effect for over 20 years and the Washington State Board of Pharmacy (Board) has failed to designate even one substance as poison. Over the last 13 months the Board has repeatedly been petitioned and requested to designate at least one of the hundreds of known toxins and specifically fluoride as “poison” and the Board remains silent and has even refused to respond in writing to numerous requests for public information. With only verbal communication from individual Board members, it appears the Washington State Board of Pharmacy (for reasons unknown) has no intent in complying with RCW 69.38.010 or other applicable poison substance statutes. The public needs local referendums and initiatives when they see state agencies fail to provide public protection.
Of significance is whether fluoride in diluted quantities, as in 1 ppm fluoridated water is still defined by statute as “poison”. When defining the term “poison”, RCW 69.38.010 appropriately does not specify the concentration or dosage of the substance, but simply defines the substance, regardless of concentration. Arsenic, strychnine, and cyanide are defined as poisons based on toxicity at full strength.
“RCW 69.38.020 Exemptions from chapter. All substances regulated under chapters 15.58, 17.21, 69.04, 69.41, and 69.50 RCW, and chapter 69.45 RCW are exempt from the provisions of this chapter.” http://apps.leg.wa.gov/RCW/default.aspx?cite=69.38.020
Chapter 15.58 RCW Washington pesticide control act
Chapter 17.21 RCW Washington pesticide application act
Chapter 69.04 RCW Intrastate commerce in food, drugs, and cosmetics
Chapter 69.41 RCW Legend drugs — prescription drugs
Chapter 69.50 RCW Uniform controlled substances act
Chapter 69.45 RCW Drug samples
F. If fluoridation substances are not exempt as legend drugs then they are poisons.
RCW 69.40.030 Placing poison or other harmful object or substance in food, drinks, medicine, or water — Penalty.
(1) . . . and every person who willfully poisons any spring, well, or reservoir of water, is guilty of a class B felony and shall be punished by imprisonment in a state correctional facility for not less than five years or by a fine of not less than one thousand dollars.”
G. Artificial fluoridation, by intent of use, is a legend drug.
RCW 69.41.010 Definitions.
9) “Drug” means: . . . (b) Substances intended for use in the diagnosis, cure, mitigation, treatment, or prevention of disease in man or animals; . . .
Artificial fluoridation of community water systems is for the purpose of mitigating and/or preventing the disease dental decay and is thus defined as a drug.
(12) “Legend drugs” means any drugs which are required by state law or regulation of the state board of pharmacy to be dispensed on prescription only or are restricted to use by practitioners only.
Drugs can be divided into three groups and all should be FDA (Food and Drug Administration) approved: narcotics under DEA control and legend drugs under state and BOP control, both requiring a licensed health care provider’s prescription, and drugs approved by the FDA for “over-the-counter” sales.
Artificial fluoridation substances, based on intent of use, are defined by RCW 69.41.010 as drugs, not DEA controlled narcotics, not “over-the-counter” FDA approved and therefore, like fluoride for ingestion which is sold in pharmacies by prescription as legend drugs, artificial fluoridation substances are legend drugs. If the BOP or state determine artificial fluoridation substances are not legend drugs, then they simply would be poisons.
The intent of adding fluoride substances to community water is to manufacture a legend (prescription) drug to prevent dental decay. The legislature’s intent to protect the public by reducing avoidable medical prescription drug errors is clear and fluoridated water is an example of avoidable medical prescription errors. “Findings — Intent — 2000 c 8: “. . . there are incidents of medication errors that are avoidable and serious mistakes that are preventable. Medical errors throughout the health care system constitute one of the nation’s leading causes of death and injury resulting in over seven thousand deaths a year, according to a recent report from the institute of medicine. The majority of medical errors do not result from individual recklessness, but from basic flaws in the way the health system is organized. There is a need for a comprehensive strategy for government, industry, consumers, and health providers to reduce medical errors. The legislature declares a need to bring about greater safety for patients in this state who depend on prescription drugs.” http://apps.leg.wa.gov/RCW/default.aspx?cite=69.41.010
G. Artificial fluoridation substances are unapproved legend drugs.
The US Supreme Court in Doe v Rumsfeld (re: anthrax) ruled even in time of war, a person cannot be medicated with an approved medicine for a purpose for which the medicine (drug) has not been approved. At least at the Federal level, police powers cannot force a person to ingest an unapproved legend drugs such as artifical fluoridation compounds.
Artificial fluoridation substances are unapproved drugs for any purpose which includes for the prevention and mitigation of dental decay. Approval for both must be obtained by the manufacturer (city or water district) from the FDA before the city or water district could use police powers to medicate anyone, let alone everyone. To date, all attempts to gain approval from the FDA for the systemic use of fluoride to treat dental decay even by prescription has failed. Dispensing the fluoride drug in community water is an unapproved method of dispensing an unapproved drug.
The FDA requires manufacturers to ensure proper warnings on legend drug labels; however, no such warning label is provided by cities or community water fluoride ingestion and has risen significantly in the last decade.
The FDA and BOP August 2008 news letter call unapproved drugs “illegal” for manufacturers to market.
The Washington State Department of Health (WSDH) assures manufacturers (community water districts) that fluoridation is safe and in effect encourages the use of fluoridation substances and guides the BOP. In effect, the WSDH has a dual conflicting role in both guiding and supervising the BOP and advising the community water system to market fluoridation.
H. All legend drugs, approved or unapproved by the FDA must be manufactured, prescribed, dispensed and administered under the supervision of licensed health care personnel as provided for by the laws and regulations of the State of Washington.
I. Environmental and International concerns add
From 1957 to 1968 fluoride air pollution was responsible for more damage claims than all 20 other major air pollutants combined. (Groth. Pen Obs. Jan-Feb 1969.)
The “solution to the air pollution” was to scrub the air and put the toxic fluoride in community water systems, saving corporations an estimated $7,000/ton in hazardous waste disposal fees plus revenue gained from the sale.
Artificial fluoridation chemicals are designated hazardous waste by the Basel Convention, the most comprehensive global environmental agreement on hazardous and other wastes, signed by 170 countries. See Annex III Class 6.1 Code H6.1 and Annex I Y32.
Toxic substances in artificial fluoridation products, such as arsenic, lead, beryllium, vanadium, cadmium, mercury, radium, radionuclides are toxic, persistent, bioaccumulative, and anthropogenic. They are listed under the 1989 First Priority Substances lists in Canada and proposed for virtual elimination under the Canadian Environmental Protection Act (CEPA 1999, 2006 update), the 1997 Binational Toxic Strategy and the 1978 Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement.
Assuming artificial fluoridation concentrations of 0.7 ppm, about 400,000kg/million people/year of fluoridation chemicals are put into community water with virtually all returning to the streams, rivers and lakes. Simply having people swallow a pea size of fluoride toothpaste would be far better for the environment.
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FOIA response from the FDA asking if fluoride is a drug. They responded, it is a drug and regulatory action is being deferred.
Washington Board of Pharmacy agrees fluoride is a legend drug. Either fluoride is regulated as a drug, or it is a poison under poison laws. The Board of Pharmacy chose to call fluoride a legend drug.
“This letter is in response to your request at the May 7,2009 meeting of the Washington Board of Pharmacy for a response to your question about designating fluoride as a poison under chapter 69.38 RCW. RCW 69.38.020 RCW 69.38.020 states that “[all1 substances regulated under chapters 15.58, 17.21, 69.04, and 69.50, and chapter 69.45RCWareexemptfromtheprovisions[ofchapter69.38RCW]. Fluoride is a legend drug regulated under chapter 69.41 RCW. RCW 69.41.010 defines a “legend drug” as drugs “which are required by state law or regulation of the state board of pharmacy to be dispensed on prescription only or are restricted to use by practitioners only.” RCW 69.38.020 states that “[all1 substances regulated under chapters 15.58, 17.21, 69.04, and 69.50, and chapter 69.45RCWareexemptfromtheprovisions[ofchapter69.38RCW].
In WAC 246-883-020 (2), the Board specified that “legend drugs are drugs which have been designated as legend drugs under federal law and are listed as such in the 2002 edition of the Drug Topics Red Book. ” Enclosed are copies of pages 169,342, and 690 of the 2002 edition of the Drug TopicsRed Book. Page 169 is the key to the products requiring prescription (legend drugs) and page 342
contains the fluoride products. Page 690 contains the listing of over-the-counter fluoride products, primarily toothpaste containing fluoride.”
Have you looked at the Drug Topics Red Book as I requested you do? Fluoride is listed as the Washington Board of Pharmacy states.
Please do your homework. I don’t have time to spoon feed the evidence.
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Anyone harmed? I would say everyone with dental fluorosis has been harmed with fluoride. About 140,000,000 Americans. But that large a number is not personal.
Speaking up against water fluoridation, I have become accounted with several people who have specific harm from contact with fluoridated water and worse reactions drinking the water. At first I was highly skeptical. However, with careful questioning and meeting Kyle, I am confident he is highly sensitive to many chemicals including fluoride.
His mom writes:
Kyle’s Story:
What I didn’t know hurt him (part one)
I have so much to be thankful for, in the holidays and year round, but today I’m talking about my Fluoride Action Network heroes, which include not just the core of FAN, but also those of you who support them and those who work in your own communities to get fluoride out of public water.
I’m the mom of a delightful young man with autism, Kyle, age 30, who is severely hypersensitive to fluoride. Sadly, I didn’t know it for the first 14 years of his life and I didn’t even know of the countless other chemical sensitivities. We’ve traveled a very long and painful road together, his pain physical (and profound), my pain emotional.
His speech is difficult, but he shows me his love and gratitude daily. He trusts me unconditionally because, in his mind, I fixed him. I got rid of the pain for Kyle, yes, but I could never have done it alone. Kyle doesn’t know of the countless FAN workers and advocates who, through their expertise, helped me to figure out how to protect my son. Most of them have never met me, never talked to me, but their work lives through the fantastic FAN website (www.FluorideACTION.net ), newsletters and videos.
My eyes get wet and blurry just thinking about 1999, when Kyle was 13-14. He was in pain constantly, all over, but especially the back of his neck and his extremities (hands, feet, lips, tongue). The chronic pain had skyrocketed after what I’ll call a “toxicological event” at age 13 from a horrific reaction to a doctor prescribed “over the counter” (OTC) treatment that is completely benign to most people.
He cried inconsolably when the pain in his fingers got so bad that he couldn’t play his beloved cello in the orchestra at school. He had to quit playing piano, too, and he could barely hold a fork to eat. There were mysterious pain “peaks”, especially in the middle of the night, but other times, too. He screamed and raced around the house as if pursued by killer bees. His school sent him home repeatedly with horrific headaches. At night the house shook wildly with the leg-pounding on the bed that was more like a 4-hour grand mal seizure than “restless leg”. His screaming was deafening. So little sleep….
We went to 8 medical specialists and not one of them could diagnose the source of the pain, let alone help relieve it. Tylenol guaranteed a full-blown migraine the next day so was useless, as were other pain-relievers. He was completely intolerant of chemicals in the air and his food, so I changed his entire diet to organic, stopped using any cleaners or scented products and got the school to cooperate with a low-chemical environment. He only drank water—nothing else.
With all of these changes, he improved, but still had pain every day, with screaming, racing, jumping, sweating, heart racing—gasping from the exertion…and crying, begging me to “Make it go away!”
A mom from Beaverton, OR with two autistic teenagers was the angel we needed. She was the one who first told me in 2000 about toxic fluoride in tap water and instructed me to switch to reverse osmosis filtered water. There was a profound improvement in 3 days! Our lives changed dramatically for the better.
No, he was not (is not) completely free of all pain—sadly, unexpected chemicals lurk everywhere. But by providing Kyle with fluoride-free water, chronic pain was no longer the 24/7 “norm”, so detecting the other chemical triggers was finally more achievable and allowed much greater success at avoidance. Fluoride remains the worst, and most difficult, to avoid. It took me many years to understand the many sources of fluoride (I will discuss these in part 2 of my letter tomorrow), and to fully realize the extent of Kyle’s sensitivity to it.
Thank God for FAN’s information that has been there for me time and time again.
It’s my hope that other children (and teens, and adults), who suffer as Kyle did, perhaps won’t suffer as long as he did. The problem is much greater for those with autism spectrum disorders. Please help FAN inform mothers across the world of the very real harm that fluoride does to some of our most vulnerable people.
There is so much more to Kyle’s “Fluoride Story”, but you’re busy and I’m out of time. FAN will be sending out part 2 tomorrow. Meanwhile, Please help FAN put a stop to fluoridation with your generous donation. I’ve already sent mine.
Audrey Adams
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Here is more from Audrey,
Kyle’s Story:
Showers that hurt? Impossible! (part two)
There are many who believe that fluoride cannot cross the skin and that acute transdermal fluoride poisoning by showering or bathing in fluoridated tap water is simply impossible. In 2008 I was one of them. If you read Part One of Kyle’s story, you already know that by the year 2000, I had finally discovered how hyper-sensitive my then 14 year old autistic son was to drinking fluoridated water, and that his pain had dramatically decreased after switching to reverse osmosis water. Lucky for me, FAN was founded that same year and as their outreach and website grew, my knowledge of fluoride grew.
By 2006 I started talking to elected and governmental officials about fluoridation and met Bill Osmunson, DDS, at a public meeting. Bill cast the line, and I caught the bait and the bug, of anti-fluoridation activism. In 2008 Bill and I spoke with over 50 state legislators or their aides about fluoridation.
Meanwhile, after 8 years of hauling thousands of gallons of reverse osmosis and spring water to my home and after 2 years of political activism in opposition to fluoridation, I was still a non-believer that a shower could harm Kyle. I used a carbon shower filter to protect him from chlorine fumes, and although I knew fluoride would not be filtered out, I naively thought it could not be absorbed through the skin.
Compared to those insanely hard, painful years prior to our initial “fluoride discovery”, Kyle was doing decently in 2008 and I thought I was an expert at protecting him from chemicals by then. Oh, but I had a lot to learn—still do!
His vastly improved quality of life had enabled him to work a part-time office job at Highline Community College. But I was stumped about morning headaches he’d been having for many months and had had multiple conversations with his doctor about it. We investigated various possible causes—was it mold? Or something in his completely organic, highly specialized breakfast? My detective skills failed me. Each morning he woke up without a headache, but before he left for work his head was throbbing.
Another angel came to our rescue—another mother of an autistic teenager. This mom had read a Letter to the Editor I had written about fluoridation and my autistic son’s reactivity, looked me up and called me. During that first 3-hour conversation, she talked about her son’s fluoride hyper-sensitivity, and her own which was even much worse. She told me of a visit to Seattle, and one bath in fluoridated water here that resulted in nasty red, itchy welts at the bath water line and below, which then bled and peeled over the next 2 weeks. I began to wonder about my mysterious itchy rash (tiny red bumps) on my scalp, chest and back and began to wonder about Kyle’s morning headaches.
The next day I had Kyle skip his morning shower. No morning headache. Then I had him shower before bed. Oh, Lordy—déjà vu! It had been many years since Kyle’s once-common, middle of the night bedroom “earth-shakes”—wildly pounding, so-called “restless legs” and many hours of screaming. (Now, seeing it again, I remembered that back in those old days I gave him Epsom Salt baths before bed for pain…in fluorinated, but de-chlorinated water.)
Oooh-kaay…I stopped the showers entirely and heated bottled water on the stove for my 220 pound grown man to sponge bathe for the next week. No morning headaches. I conducted several more “shower trials”, still using the carbon shower filter, and all were followed by head pain around 5-15 minutes after showering (even before any food had been eaten). I tried the evening shower only once more, with the same screaming aftermath into the middle of the night. Clearly, the pain was much worse with the bedtime showers, but I had no idea why.
Over the next 6 months or so, I tried many different shower filters, but none protected Kyle from fluoridation chemicals enough to avoid the after-shower headaches.
When we’d go camping for a week or two, I’d call ahead about the fluoridation status. Campgrounds almost never have added fluoride, but do have chlorine. Kyle does not get headaches when showering at campgrounds or when we’d visit relatives near Portland with no fluoridation, but with chlorination. Same with motels—in fluoridated towns, headaches followed the shower. In non-fluoridated motels, even in the absence of a chlorine filter, he did not get headaches after showering.
Now that I was connecting the fluoride dots, I also noticed that my itchy rash disappeared after 3-4 days of no fluoridated showers and returned about a week after resuming. Oddly, I’ve never seen a similar rash on Kyle, but I have since talked to several other women who also get tiny red itchy bumps on their scalp from fluoridated showers. Could we be reacting to a different fluoridation contaminant, I wonder?
After all those months of bottled water sponge baths, I finally found a shower filter on http://www.mercola.com that, while it makes no claims to do so, removes enough of the fluoridation chemicals for Kyle to be able to shower IF we do all 4 of these things:
Set a timer and limit the shower to 4 minutes;
Use warm water, not hot;
Keep water pressure at the lowest possible, about 1 gal/min, for maximum filtration contact;
Change filter at 3 months, not 6 as the manufacturer suggests, which for our usage is about 700 minutes of total run-time on the filter. Kyle starts to get after-shower headaches between 3-4 months of use on this filter.
There are other methods to remove fluoridation chemicals from bathing water, such as in-home reverse osmosis systems, but this was the simplest and cheapest for us. Seattle’s water is soft, but with harder water (higher mineral content), the effectiveness of filters may be less.
I am eternally grateful to FAN and all of the “Friends of FAN” that I heavily rely on to educate me about fluoride and fluoridation. My holiday wish today is to see an end to the unnecessary curse of fluoridation so that I can help other families like mine focus on caring for their loved ones with autism and other neurodevelopmental disabilities, rather than spending valuable time and resources trying to provide safe, poison-free water for their children.
I hope you’ll help FAN put a halt to water fluoridation by giving generously.
Audrey Adams
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And here is part 3
Kyle’s Story:
What’s wrong with that turkey?!…and other food troubles (part three)
The trouble with food is that it is very inconsistent. Long ago I made the poor assumption that a food was safe if my favorite natural/organic store sold it. My trust was misplaced because unlabeled ingredients are the norm, and unless it’s a dental product, fluoride is one big secret. Buyer beware.
Here I was, completely unprepared to safely feed my profoundly chemically sensitive—but hungry—teenage autistic son, Kyle. I learned as I went and, since I had stopped his chronic 24/7 pain by halting his fluoridated drinking water, I could finally see the results of my food mistakes…and rather quickly.
I remember a particular trip—I was taking an intimidating stack of paperwork regarding Kyle’s disability to a state agency. As we drove, Kyle was calm and happy…that is, until he ate the “natural” protein bar I handed him. In barely more than a minute, Kyle’s 220 pound frame was madly butt-pounding the seat next to me (that’s what happens when you “jump” while still wearing a seat belt—he’s compliant with rules). My car was literally jumping down the road. It was hard to control the car, but impossible to control my son—screaming in pain, heart pounding, sweating profusely. It was a terrible day, but it did get the attention of the otherwise bored state worker as we arrived.
I didn’t know then that the chocolate in the protein bar could contain high levels of fluoride due to pesticides, but it’s right here on this FAN website and also this one. Organic cocoa and chocolate is safe, but conventional can be quite risky.
Another food event, this time Thanksgiving, when Kyle was in his early 20’s. There were 14 eager eaters and I had had the (not so) bright idea of cooking an “all natural” turkey breast instead of a whole bird. The very few ingredients on the label were all safe. Kyle adores family, but he cherishes food above nearly all things. He was the first one eagerly seated at the Thanksgiving table and, without waiting, helped himself to the turkey I had just put on the table. In approximately 5 bites’ time (for Kyle that’s about 60 seconds), he shot up out of his chair, instantly screaming, running, jumping, all over the house—heart pounding so hard it was literally visible through his shirt—cherry red ears and large red blotches on his face, neck and chest. He didn’t stop for about a half hour when he finally collapsed on the couch, panting and sweating, in pain. He finally slept, unable to eat. Everyone was traumatized. It was as if my guests had witnessed a terrible accident…and I guess it was. An “accident” I caused, just to save a little time. I hadn’t even spiced the meat. So what on earth was wrong with that turkey breast?!
FAN’s website answered my question—there it was, clearly listed, avoid “mechanically deboned poultry”, due to high fluoride content. (Exactly how remains a mystery to me.) About 2 years later I bravely (or stupidly) tried organic chicken breast. Kyle had an identical reaction, but much less severe and not as long. The next day I called the 800 number on the chicken package and learned that the very same mechanical deboning method is used for organic poultry. Kyle can eat any poultry still on the bone without pain, organic or conventional, but he doesn’t prefer it thanks to bad memories.
The good news is that I can describe certain events that were the result of acute fluoride exposures ONLY because Kyle is not suffering from chronic fluoride toxicity from fluoridated water anymore. FAN’s ongoing dedicated work will someday result in eliminating chronic fluoride poisoning from tap water for those children whose parents have no idea that it’s contributing to similar frightening behavior.
And thanks to my awareness of fluoride due to Kyle’s hyper-sensitivity (and all the information at my fingertips through FAN), I made some very interesting discoveries about my own reactions to fluoride ingestion that I would not have understood otherwise. I do not get headaches (and I don’t scream and jump either!), but I do get mild to very severe pain in certain joints—specifically, the joint that was at the lowest point during sleep (whichever hip) or the joint most used during the day—about 4-5 hours after consuming certain non-organic chocolate products.
I do not have arthritis, but I do love chocolate and I have experienced more than a dozen acute arthritic-like pain events (over several years’ time) for stupidly eating conventional chocolate. Sometimes even just tiny amounts of it, like last Friday. Unfortunately, it’s like Russian Roulette with chocolate because many conventionally grown cocoa products are okay while others can be very high in fluoride, depending on the (unlabeled) pesticide levels. But the only way I can determine with certainty that the pain was caused by a specific food item is to wait a month or more, and free of any pain, then re-test that same chocolate product on myself. Unfortunately for the testee (me!), I have positively confirmed the pain culprit every time I have done this, which really takes the fun out of chocolate.
I wasn’t brave enough, however, to re-test myself when I had a horrible reaction to organic green tea. I knew both green and black tea can be very high in fluoride, but I had a momentary lack of judgment. (Organic tea can be better, but wasn’t this time.) I drank it in late morning and, according to my own special “fluoride clock” started feeling an uncomfortable right shoulder at 2-ish and crying pain by 5pm. What was I doing? Typing and “mousing” on the computer.
Pain from fluoride is a very mysterious thing and I don’t pretend to understand it, but I do want to impress upon you that if you are chronically exposing yourself to fluoride, for example by drinking tea or a mocha latte every day, you cannot know for sure that the pains you have are not caused by it.
FAN is an incredible resource for those of us who already know we are hyper-sensitive to fluorides, and for those of you who perhaps haven’t yet realized it, or those whose symptoms might take much longer to manifest. Let’s keep this good thing going strong! Please consider a donation to FAN today.
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Bill, I’m afraid I don’t have time right now to respond to everything, but glancing through your comments I came across “Kyle’s story.”
I am familiar with that amazing story. I’ve read it. I’ll comment more on it later, but for now . . You can’t be serious.
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Dr. Bill Osmunson.
It really does not get any better than this!!! You truly are the gift that keeps on giving.
Twice in this thread, just prior to your last series of comments, I accused you of being a Shill for Mercola (you know, because Mercola funds you, and it’s bottom line is improved by the paranoia that you try to push).
This is the part of “Kyle’s story” that I enjoyed the most:
“After all those months of bottled water sponge baths, I finally found a shower filter on http://www.mercola.com that, while it makes no claims to do so, removes enough of the fluoridation chemicals for Kyle to be able to shower IF we do all 4 of these things: . . . .
“I hope you’ll help FAN put a halt to water fluoridation by giving generously.”
You gave me an advertisement for Mercola’s amazing shower heads. (It might be a good idea to actually read through your copy/pastes before you post them 😉 )
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Dr. Osmunson, to your other comments:
“You have failed to respond to the synopsis of 10 research articles I posted which found a decrease in IQ with fluoride exposure.”
Response: We are not discussing 10 research articles under another post.
Right now, we are discussing this bogus claim from you:
” “ FDA has never approved swallowing fluoride with intent to prevent dental caries because the evidence of effectiveness is “incomplete.””
For the 6th time now, please show me anything from the FDA that proves what you just said. (I don’t need 8 pages of irrelevant material. One paragraph on an FDA website with a link will be fine.)
For the 3rd time now, the FDA does not consider optimally fluoridated water a drug. If I am wrong, please provide anything from the FDA which disproves this.
Your copy-pastes about Legend drugs, and fluoride in particular, are irrelevant to this question.
Let me try to illustrate what I mean.
Did you know that the FDA considers Oxygen a “drug?” See: https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/cder/daf/index.cfm?event=overview.process&ApplNo=205889
But the FDA does not consider optimally oxygenated air (you know, air) a drug. In the same way, while the FDA may consider some forms of fluoride in higher concentrations a “drug,” the FDA does not consider optimally fluoridated water to be a drug. Get it?
So . . . let’s make it for the 4th time now — the FDA does not consider optimally fluoridated water a drug. Therefore, when you say that optimally fluoridated bottled water (which the FDA regulates) has not been approved by the FDA for ingestion as a drug, you are being deceitful.
Something that is not considered a “drug” by the FDA can neither be denied, nor approved as such. If I am wrong, please provide anything from the FDA which disproves this by classifying optimally fluoridated water a drug or medicine.
I eagerly await your next set of non-answers to these questions.
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Oh . . one more thing . . this comment from you —
Bill Osmunson: Anyone harmed? I would say everyone with dental fluorosis has been harmed with fluoride. About 140,000,000 Americans. But that large a number is not personal.”
Harm means quality of life is diminished. For example, if someone was suffering pain from dental decay, that would diminish quality of life.
As you must know, very mild and mild dental fluorosis are characterized by healthier teeth which are more resistant to decay. Now, if any of these 140,000,000 Americans would care to sue their local governments because they are suffering from stronger teeth, and if they actually won the case, you might actually have an argument.
By the way, In a country where lawsuits are practically a way of life — so much so that McDonald’s was actually successfully sued because it’s coffee was too hot — you would think lawyers would be lining up, foaming at the mouth, to get a piece of the action from Kyle & Audry and all the unbelievable suffering they have had to endure.
You know some lawyers, don’t you? Isn’t Michael Connett, Paul Connett’s son, a lawyer? Why don’t you hand that case over to him?
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Thanks to all for a great discussion. The main reason I considered the Mexico IQ paper to be “anti-F” is that it leaves out the overwhelming plus of prenatal fluoride: nice teeth.
Prenatal Fluoride (PNF) Studies
Lead author, journal, citation Number of children in study Age when checked
(years) Percent reduction in tooth decay
Feltman
J Dent Med 1961 16(4):190-198 228 7 96%
Hoskova
Cesk Pediatr 1968 23:438-441 78 4 93%
Kailis
Med J Austral 1968 2:1037-1040 50 5 82%
Pritchard
Austral Dent J 1969 14:335-338 176 7 70%
Schutzmannsky
Dtsch Stomatol 1971 21:122-129 100 9 36%
Percent with no sign of tooth decay
Glenn
Am J Obstet Gynecol 1982 143:560-64 117 5 97%
Leverett
Caries Res 1997; 31:174-179 398 5 92%
Ray Grogan (319) 321-5685 raygrogan@hotmail.com
https://www.dropbox.com/s/htd3q4ma7tucea7/Anti-F%20IQ%20me%20write%20a%20little%20balance%20%E2%80%93%20fluoride%20writers%20should%20give%20mg%20per%20kg%20ID%20who%20to%20deny%20%E2%80%93%20PNF%20illegal.docx?dl=0
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Ken, the first thing that needs to be said about your blog, despite its smug and self-congratulatory title, is that you do not have an open mind on the subject of water fluoridation. If yours is an example of an open mind, then it needs to be closed for urgent repairs. In truth, you don’t even see yourself that way, rather as a defence attorney defending to the death your corrupt client.
Any defence attorney who stood up in court and declared himself “open-minded” on the guilt of the accused would in any case be promptly dismissed as incompetent. Only a judge or jury are required to make such a claim, so you fail on both counts. You pretend to be an unbiased judge while relentlessly pushing your own bias.
So let’s be honest, you are acting as a (fake) defence attorney for a multi-million dollar toxic waste disposal scheme, and to that end your sole purpose is to devalue every study or piece of evidence of harm or ineffectiveness, and to accept uncritically every study which appears to support your case. When have you ever required such evidence to be subject to the same standards of scrutiny you apply to evidence which does not suit your case? I’ve never come across any sign of such balance on your blog. So please abandon the pretence of being open-minded. Your bias stands out in neon lights.
Your sole and singular objective is to protect water fluoridation, not dental health -or any other aspect of human health. If you had a serious interest in dental health, you would be congratulating all those European countries which have equalled or exceeded without fluoridation the improvements which have coincided with water fluoridation in other parts of the developed world (and could reasonably be assumed to have occurred without it) and ask them how they achieved these results. You would be congratulating the Scottish health authorities for the spectacular results of their “Childsmile” program which, unlike your pet obsession, involves intelligent human intervention, individual responsibility, action and consent, and calling for it to be implemented in your own country.
A real scientist would fall about laughing at the ludicrous claim, made in the name of the American CDC, that water fluoridation is “one of the top ten public health achievements of the 20th. century”. So should all those unfluoridated European countries who got the same improvements and better without it. The greatest scientific fraud of all time would be much closer to the truth.
One might think that an intelligent scientist who believed in the benefits of fluoride would applaud the scientific approach of brushing that fluoride directly on the tooth surface in extremely high concentrations and spitting out the residue, rather than swallowing it in diluted form? One might think that an intelligent scientist concerned about tooth decay would campaign against the corrosive commercial products children put in their mouths which cause decay in the first place? Much easier, though, to go with the big money and promote the (toxic) by-product of another industry as the answer to the problem, which it manifestly is not.
Ken, you are not an unbiased scientist desperately fighting to protect public health. You are a fraud, pure and simple. Your only interest is to protect water fluoridation, whatever it costs, whatever it takes.
Peter
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Peter, your resort to an unjustified and unsupported personal attack in a comment on an article discussing a scientific study tells me you are not able to critique my article or find any fault in my scientific analysis.
I think that says enough about your comment.
You are of course welcome to join in a discussion of the science but please no more personal attacks.
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Everyone has bias and that’s why science has theories and no theories are written in stone. To seriously examine one’s theory with balanced objectivity is a constant challenge. 50% of what we know in medicine/dentistry to be true, is actually false. Our problem is we don’t know which 50% is false. An open mind. . . if that is possible. . . should be encouraged and attempted. Too often in these blogs and public discourse, humility and caution are lacking.
Ken,
In my attempt to be open minded, I first look at JURISDICTION. What government regulatory agency has jurisdiction over substances used with intent to treat or prevent disease? Food and Drug Administrations says fluoride is a drug, and they have not backed down. FDA has never approved ingestion of fluoride with the intent to prevent disease. 70 years fluoride ingestion has been pushed, still not approved. . . for lack of evidence of efficacy. Of course everyone has the right to their opinion, but I do put significant weight on the science reaching the level of confidence to persuade the FDA to approve. (The argument that the EPA has jurisdiction is mistaken. Congress has forbidden the EPA to add anything to water for the treatment of people. EPA treats water, not people).
Second, THE BURDEN OF PROOF: Who profits from the substance and markets the product? There is big money and the money is required to gain (pay for) approval. The FDA requires the manufacturer before marketing to gain FDA NDA. For me, the FDA is reasonable. It is not the FDA’s job to run down every claim and disprove the claim. The requirement is for the manufacturer to prove their claim to the satisfaction of the FDA.
The FDA is clear, until FDA NDA approval, the substance is an illegal drug. It is not the patient’s/consumer’s responsibility to prove efficacy or safety of substances sold with intent to prevent disease. Requirement prior to marketing is placed on the final manufacturer. Those making the money must do the research and provide to the FDA. Very reasonable.
Third, QUALITY RESEARCH: Now to the topic at hand, research and science. The FDA first requires adequate science to demonstrate efficacy at a specific dosage. Again, makes sense. If a substance has no benefit at a specific dosage, we don’t know at what dosage to test safety, risk, label/legend. Only after efficacy is demonstrated adequately, then risk can be evaluated at the recommended dosage which is shown to be beneficial.
The FDA claims the evidence of efficacy for fluoride ingestion is “incomplete.” Surprising to dentists and public health professionals. And although the quantity of studies are significant, the quality of research on efficacy is not adequate. The excuse “it can’t be done” is a cop out, head buried in the sand, and blind. The first job for promoters is to get the quality research to demonstrate efficacy. It can be done and should be done. Until efficacy is demonstrated, safety discussions are premature because we don’t know the dosage for efficacy.
EFFICACY: Until quality research is provided on efficacy at a specific dosage, supplementation is premature, especially without consent in an uncontrolled manner. Quality research on current exposure at all ages and health without supplementation first, and then determine dosage difference between exposure and efficacy to supplement the inadequate intake, if any. The problem is compounded by synergistic chemicals, many sources, individual differences in exposure, etc. But for me, we must have a higher level of quality research if we are going to use police powers, take away a person’s freedom of choice, supplement their intake of anything without rock solid good science accepted by the regulatory jurisdictions.
DISCUSSION OF SAFETY: We certainly have a right to study safety because fluoride exposure comes from many sources. I think most would agree there is no scientific study which can claim absolute proof requiring no further study. Such a claim would automatically reject the study. Each study adds to our understanding. The Bashash study currently under discussion is one of the better studies on IQ and fluoride.
One criticism is “we don’t know urine fluoride concentrations in all the USA population.” True, valid. Not everyone has had their urine tested for fluoride and monitored over time. And who’s job is it to test the urine fluoride concentration for everyone?
Those promoting even more supplementation of fluoride or those opposed? Clearly, proponents must provide adequate measures of current exposure prior to supplementation recommendations.
And who’s job is it to provide quality studies on fluoride’s safety for all current exposure levels? Those promoting supplementation, not the patient who is objecting to supplementation.
If you don’t like the studies, show us the quality studies you rely on for desired dosage, current exposure, desired supplementation, and safety for all individuals, ages, levels of health, chemical sensitivities and synergistic chemical interactions.
If you have carefully read my post, you will not change the subject and will consider jurisdiction, dosage, efficacy and safety as a “package” of concepts to be answered prior to mass medication/supplementation.
Bill
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Bill, you make this very strange comment – “If you don’t like the studies.” As a scientist, it’s not a matter for me of “liking” or “not liking.” Its a matter of looking at the evidence. Its a matter of reading each report or paper critically and intelligently. That is normal and expected for a scientific approach.
Now I have made some evaluations of this paper. I have extracted the data they used and carried out my own statistical analysis. I have discussed my critique and conclusions from this in several posts. I have prepared a document for submission to the journal involved drawing attention to the unwarranted way that people like you and Paul Connett have interpreted this paper and the political campaigns you are using it for. (I am still negotiating the format with the journal but you can read my working draft here – Predictive accuracy of a model for child IQ based on maternal prenatal urinary fluoride concentration. I have had some peer review of this but, of course, I welcome your feedback on it.)
You say “To seriously examine one’s theory with balanced objectivity is a constant challenge.” OK, you are using the word “theory” in a naive way but in essence, I support this concept 100% and that is why scientists don’t fall down and accept new studies without any critical analysis. And that is why I welcome, in fact, encourage, feedback and critique of my articles here and elsewhere.
That is why I offered you a right of reply, an opportunity for a good faith scientific exchange on these questions. It was you who, after initially accepting, pulled out under pressure from your colleagues at FAN.
Bill, I am a scientist – not a politician, lawyer or public policy expert. I do not have expertise in those areas – nor do I pretend to have such expertise.
As far as advocacy for and implementation of the social health policy of community water fluoridation goes I leave that up to politicians and specialists in those areas. My only involvement, apart from attempting to clarify the science which is being misrepresented and distorted, has been to support democratic decisions of local citizens when our council was encouraged by political activists to ignore voters and stop fluodiation. That, becuase of pressure form people who like me were concerned with democracy, has fortunately been reversed.
But surely it is clear from my activity here that my concern is the science – and to challenge those who misrepresent and distort the science on a range of issues like evolutionary science, climate change and fluoride chemistry.
So, of course, I am not going to get involved in a debate on things like juridiction, the FDA or NDA. Those are simply diversions.
So, please discuss the science. Criticise my evaluation of the science. But please stop your diversions. Diversions simply used because you are unable to fault my scientific critiques but are determined to continue promoting political programmes like the current one aimed at scaremonger pregnant women.
You have been offered an opportunity for a scientific exchange, a good faith exchange. You declined. That is the current situation.
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Ken,
I’m amazed at your ability the subject. You picked a term “like” to argue with the term rather than the heart of my comment. Top quality scientists evaluating the science is not a diversion.
There are many types, kinds, or professions of scientists. I am not an Epidemiologist or research statistician. I am a dentist and public health educator. The evaluation of research is as you say, “critically and intelligently” “normal and expected” is important, I agree. The best scientists to critically, intelligently, normally and expected review of the science are the life time scientists in the agencies charged with doing precisely that. When I point to them, I am not causing a “diversion” I am hitting the nail on the head, the subject and topic of the discussion.
“Intelligent and critical” needs to come from a good scientific research background and a global perspective, and that is the job of the full time employed scientists charged with evaluating that science.
In my opinion, you have missed some critical aspects of research methodology, lack a global perspective on the topic, fail to appreciate toxicology, epidemiology, research methods, and of most importance, the very experts charged with evaluating the science agree with me.
You said, “So, of course, I am not going to get involved in a debate on things like juridiction, the FDA or NDA. Those are simply diversions.”
Ken, those are the experts who have set up the best methods to evaluate a substance whether it is effective and safe at a specific dosage with label. Those experts are not “diversions.” Good scientists and governments do not call the drug regulatory authorities “diversions.” Those are the experts we the people have chosen and employee to evaluate the science. NO DIVERSION. That is their job, their training, their expertise.
To suggest that you and I are the final authorities on evaluating the science for others is wrong Yes, you are the end authority for you individually (informed consent) and I the authority for me , but neither you nor I are the authority for others. If you want more fluoride for you, swallow more fluoride. But don’t force me to swallow it. What about freedom of choice are you apposed to?
You also mention your concern and support for democracy. Yes, but the current USA President, and many other democratically elected leaders such as Hitler, are examples of powerful marketing, influencing the democratic vote to make a bad public choice and policy. If good scientists do not agree on the complex issue of fluoridation, throwing the complex scientific issue to the voters rather than scientific experts at drug regulatory jurisdictions makes no sense.
We pay these good scientists to evaluate the science. Why do you evade, avoid, divert and refuse to consider their expert judgment?
Ken, you said, “Bill, I am a scientist – not a politician, lawyer or public policy expert. I do not have expertise in those areas – nor do I pretend to have such expertise.”
There are many scientific professions and being a scientist in one profession does not make one an expert in another scientific profession, we would agree. Neither am I a lawyer. But as a public health expert and dentist, I deal more with public policy more than many scientists. I deal with science as it applies to both the individual patient and the public at large. Both individual and public health evaluation of research is critical.
The review of science to make it applicable to patients and the public needs to be inclusive of all streams of evidence, not just dentistry or chemistry or epidemiology or statistics. A global view is not a diversion. And each study needs to be taken in context and with understanding of other studies in that area.
Ken, I feel your thought processes are backwards. I tried to express this above, but when you failed to mention it, I need to bring it up again.
We both demand quality research. YES. We don’t have quality research. So who’s responsibility is it to get the good research??? Please answer. You imply the patient must prove with high quality research that fluoride ingestion is harmful and until uncontested proof of harm, you seem to take the line of thinking to imply fluoride ingestion is therefore safe to swallow in any dosage until the patient provides the quality research of harm.
I agree we demand quality research. And I specifically defer to the laws and logic that it is the final manufacturer who must provide the quality research, not the patient. A health claim requires approval based on adequate science.
We can discuss the more than 50 studies which suggest fluoride is neurotoxic. But that misses the point.
WHERE ARE THE STUDIES YOU RELY ON WHICH PROVE FLUORIDE INGESTION IS SAFE TO THE BRAIN, THYROID, BONES, TEETH, MITOCHONDRIA, KIDNEYS, INTESTINES AND THE ENTIRE BODY.
After 70 years, quality studies on neither efficacy nor safety have been done. Manufacturers have failed to provide those studies. Regulatory authorities have said, the science is “incomplete.” So public health professionals have gone to the public to vote fluoride supplementation based on weak and historic studies.
Good scientists, the best, say “NO.” My public health profession has bypassed the good scientists and gone to the voters.
Personally, I put more credibility on educated scientists charged with the task of evaluating the science more than either blog scientists, public health policy advocates or the masses of voters under the influence of powerful marketing propaganda. All can be wrong, but in this case the FDA scientists appear to be correct.
If Bashish were the first and only study reporting lower IQ with increased fluoride exposure, I would be concerned but skeptical. With many animal and human studies consistent with Bashish, and several coming out each year, and higher quality coming out, then we can no longer bury our heads in the sand and claim fluoride exposure is harmless. The question is still dosage, timing, synergistic chemicals and host sensitivity. But safety for all at common exposure levels is not safe nor effective.
Bottom line, public health policy of mass medicating through an uncontrolled dosage of drinking water, with dental fluorosis going over 60% of the young, taking into account the studies on thyroid, bones, intestines, kidneys, cells, cancer etc. etc. and no quality studies of efficacy. . . then fluoridation is a public health crime against humanity.
Get the studies of efficacy and safety and then start fluoridation. Ass backwards is barbaric.
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What a rave, Bill – I thought with your usual concentration on Twitter you might have learned to be more succinct.
Anyway, I cannot see what you are getting at (and suspect you yourself don’t know) so I will just respond with this:
Show me a single study indicating harm from community water fluoridation. Show me a single study indicating F is “neurotoxic” (wrong word – but it is a common mistake for anti-=fluioide propagandists) at concentrations used in CWF. Show me a single study indication CWF is harmful to “THE BRAIN, THYROID, BONES, TEETH, MITOCHONDRIA, KIDNEYS, INTESTINES AND THE ENTIRE BODY.”
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And, Bill, isn’t this a bit perverse. You specifically pulled out of an agreement for a good faith scientific exchange here under pressure from your FAN colleagues. Isn’t it extremely strange for you to come back and use the comments section when you could have been posting separate articles?
Do your fellow anti-F activists know what you are doing?
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You must have me mixed up with someone else. I’m not on Twitter. Long time ago my daughter got me on and I don’t think I ever got back on in part because I think it needs a password which I don’t remember and I have not tried to get on for years.
You don’t like the quality of the thousands of research articles reporting harm at various dosages of fluoride? You have that right and to a very great degree I agree with you. Most research on ingestion of fluoride is low or fair quality. We essentially agree.
And that in and of itself is proof CWF should be stopped.
We seem to agree the research is not adequate quality. The FDA has said, “incomplete.” Are you in agreement with the FDA? I am.
We disagree on the fact that everyone should be given additional fluoride without their consent, based on inadequate research.
You want governments to add fluoride to the diet of everyone when no one knows how much fluoride each person (the patient) is ingesting.
You want freedom of choice to be removed, ignored and no label to be required.
You want forced supplementation/medication for everyone, those without teeth, infants, fetus, elderly, chemically sensitive, those swallowing tooth paste, those with dental fluorosis, those with environmental fluoride exposures from other sources, CWF for everyone based on poor incomplete science on efficacy and safety.
Makes no sense to me.
Instead, your argument turns the table and expects the unwilling patient to provide quality research before you will stop forcing the patient to ingest more fluoride.
The job of quality research is yours, not mine.
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My apologies, Bill. I did mix you up with Hardy Limeback. He is acting like a crazy bot on Twitter these days. Quite irrational.
I must admit to getting you anti-F guys mixed up at times – seeing the arguments you all start to look the same. 🙂
Notice, though, you could not answer a single question of mine. You cannot find a single study showing harm from CWF. Telling, isn’t it?
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Telling yes.
Tells you one thing and me another.
Tells you CWF is safe and more should enjoy the “benefit” until those harmed can raise the money to do the research to prove harm. (I see this as everything is safe unless proven harmful. Sort of like “no proof of global warming so it does not exist”)
Tells me we must stop CWF until the manufacturer does the research to demonstrate to the appropriate regulatory agencies that CWF is safe for everyone.
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By the way, getting me mixed up with Hardy Limeback is the greatest compliment you could give me. I’m honored. Thank you.
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So let me answer your CWF question, again. Appears you are reading too fast and missing the answers.
You asked for one study demonstrating harm from CWF. (There are several, but first some basics which you avoid.)
Your question lacks scientific understanding between concentration and dosage. Until you grasp that basic concept, you will not grasp the research.
Concentration of fluoride in water is well controlled. Individual dosage of fluoride is out of control.
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Some ingest a great deal of fluoride (60% fluorosis in the USA) while others ingest much less.
In order to discuss the research, please put down in numbers the dosage range of fluoride ingestion you find to be ideal and the dosage range of fluoride individual patients are ingesting.
We need to discuss one step at a time. If we can’t come up with those two basic concepts, then it is hard to discuss any research…other than esoteric argument.
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Bill – you say:
That is just avoidance. First, nothing at all. You claim there are several studies demonstrating harm from CWF – but refuse to cite them.
I call your bluff – you do not know of any at all.
You also refer to “Those harmed” needing to “raise the money to do the research to prove harm.”
Can you cite a single example of anyone suffering harm from CWF as normally operated? Anyone at all.
Again I call your bluff.
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Avoidance? Bluff? Slip sliding Ken.
There are millions being harmed with excess fluoride exposure as determined with the bio-marker, dental fluorosis.
When CWF started, the public was assured dental fluorosis, a biomarker of excess fluoride exposure, would not exceed 10%-15%. By 2000, NHANES reported 40% had dental fluorosis. By 2012 NHANES reported 60% dental fluorosis, 20% with moderate and over 2% with severe dental fluorosis.
The NRC 2006 determined that severe dental fluorosis is an adverse effect of too much fluoride while the tooth is developing under the skin, prior to about 8 years of age.
Before we review the studies on dental fluorosis, a disease which I and most dentists treat in our dental practices, we need to come to an understanding of the dosage of fluoride which you think is good and how much you think is harmful. What are the acceptable therapeutic, safe, and excess dosages of fluoride? You should have those numbers clear in your mind.
If we don’t set a dosage which you find acceptable, then you will slide like a greased pig. . . as you have been doing above. So lets get some numbers down which you accept, dosage, and work from there.
One of the problems with studies focused on CWF, is CWF provides about a third to two thirds of the dosage of fluoride for most people. And people don’t drink the same amount of water. And of course synergistic effects, host sensitivity, and numerous other problems.
If you are unwilling to consider dosage, then the research will not be understood.
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You do not have any studies you can cite, do you Bill?
I am well aware of the damage in areas of endemic fluorosis where F intake is too high – but that is a diversion – as I showed in my article The 52 IQ studies used by anti-fluoride campaigners
You are simply attempting to confuse the issue.
However, it is interesting you appear ready to fall back to Connett’s position that we can not find a relationship between any harm like cognitive deficits and CWF because the difference in F intake is too small. (See Anti-fluoridationists rejection of IQ studies in fluoridated area.)
That make one wonder why the hell you people are attempting to stop CWF – knowing it will not make any difference.
Weird.
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Dr. Osmunson, you have said: “Ken,
In my attempt to be open minded, I first look at JURISDICTION. What government regulatory agency has jurisdiction over substances used with intent to treat or prevent disease?”
In my attempt to be open minded and determine motive, I first look at MONEY. Could you please tell me how much money was funded to the Fluoride Action Network by Mercola in 2017 so that FAN could help Mercola sell its unnecessary stuff to a gullible public by pushing its particular brand of paranoia about optimally fluoridated water?
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By the way, and as irrelevant as it is, the USEPA, a government agency you failed to mention, has Federal JURISDICTION over community water fluoridation in the U.S., and State Environmental Agencies, other agencies you failed to mention, have JURISDICTION over enforcement of CWF. As a Canadian you may not be completely familiar with the nuances of State or Federal responsibilities in the U.S. I hope this helps (although I’m sure it won’t, since you keep making this irrelevant mistake no matter how often you are corrected.)
The FDA has JURISDICTION over the distribution of Bottled Water, since it is considered a “food.” And, as you know, in 2006, the FDA approved the following health claim notification for fluoridated bottled water: “Drinking fluoridated water may reduce the risk of [dental caries or tooth decay].”
And as you know, fluoridated bottled water is distributed under the JURISDICTION of the FDA for the sole purpose off human ingestion.
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David, I am a US Citizen. Born in the USA. I’m not Canadian. I have gained FDA NDA on a dental device and gone through the FDA approval process. I did not hire assistance, but studied the approval process and went through the complex approval process myself. I can assure you, the FDA approval process is reasonably rigorous and complex. . . but I feel fair.
The USEPA is prohibited by Congress from adding anything to water for the treatment of humans. Read the SDWA. If you send me your email address I can send you letters from the EPA attorney. February 14, 2013 from Steven M. Neugeboren, Associate General Counsel, Water Law Office, confirms there was no agreement to take away responsibility from the FDA and give to the EPA responsibility for regulating water additives intended for preventive health care purposes and unrelated to contamination of public drinking water.
In a letter from the Office of the Regional Administrator, Region 10, April 7, 2011, “EPA does not provide recommendations for the addition of any substance (including fluoride) to drinking water for preventive health care purposes and is prohibited by SDWA from setting such requirements.”
In contrast, the Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act:
“Drugs are defined as “articles intended for use in the diagnosis, cure, mitigation, treatment, or prevention of disease” [FD&C Act, sec. 201(g)(1)].
Washington State Law, RCW 69.38.010 “As used in this chapter “poison” means: (1) Arsenic and its preparations; (2) Cyanide and its preparations, including hydrocyanic acid; (3) Strychnine; and (4) Any other substance designated by the state board of pharmacy which, when introduced into the human body in quantities of sixty grains or less, causes violent sickness or death.”
60 grains is 3,888 mg.
Fluoride can be lethal at as low as 5 mg/kg.
However, fluoride is exempt from poison laws when it is regulated as a drug, pesticide or herbicide. Note, fluoride is not exempt from drug laws when diluted in public water.
The Washington Board of Pharmacy responded to my request on whether fluoride is a drug, “Fluoride is a legend drug regulated under chapter 69.41 RCW. RCW 69.41.010 defines a ‘legend drug’ as drugs ‘which are required by state law or regulation of the state board of pharmacy to be dispensed on prescription only or are restricted to use by practitioners only.”
State of Washington Department of Health Board of Pharmacy June 4, 2009 letter to Bill Osmunson DDS;
RCW 69.41.010(12) defines legend drugs; WAC 246-883-020(2) states legend drugs are listed in 2002 Drug Topics Red Book (relevant Red Book pages including page 342 that lists “Fluoride” are attached to the above-referenced Board letter.
I asked the EPA and they confirmed, EPA does not have jurisdiction over the addition of fluoride to water. EPA attorney confirmed FDA has authority over all substances used with the intent to prevent disease.
EPA does protect the fluoride contaminant by keeping the Maximum Contaminant Level high enough to allow those who want to fluoridated to do so. (Fluoride is a contaminant in water. Why do you want to contaminate water?)
You are correct, that the FDA regulates the health claim of benefit from fluoride add to bottled water. Congress passed a new law that permits a manufacturer to “notify” the FDA of a health claim if two other Federal Agencies support the substance. The FDA was notified of the health claim. No evaluation of research on effectiveness or safety were involved.
So fluoridated bottled water did not go through the FDA regulatory process and the FDA had no authority to stop the addition of fluoride to bottled water.
And it simply makes no sense to exempt drugs from FDA jurisdiction and then become the jurisdiction of the EPA simply by diluting with public water. If so, a person could be exempt from FDA oversight by taking any drug such as Viagra, antibiotics, or pain meds and diluting in public water. No transfer of authority has been made to the EPA.
The EPA regulates contaminants in water, not the intentional addition of contaminants to water with the intent to treat humans or animals.
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Dr. Osmunson thank you for your reply. It looks like Dr. Perrott is correct. It appears that you intent on arguing the irrelevant issue of legal jurisdiction for CWF to avoid the science. If I am mistaken about your nationality I apologize. I’m not sure where I got the idea that you are Canadian. Maybe I am confusing you with Dr. Limeback or some other outlier.
Nevertheless, you are incorrect. You say, “The USEPA is prohibited by Congress from adding anything to water for the treatment of humans. Read the SDWA.”
I am very familiar with the Federal Safe Drinking Water Act, and I am very familiar with Michigan’s SDWA. There is nothing in it which “prohibits” anything of the sort. Please provide the statute from the Federal SDWA which you believe prohibits the addition of fluoride to water.
The opinion of an attorney regarding the administrative jurisdiction of CWF is irrelevant. It is a mystery to me why you don’t take your “jurisdictional arguments” to court instead of posting irrelevant and incorrect comments on a science blog. As you know, in 1979 a Memorandum of Understanding between the FDA & the EPA placed community water fluoridation under the jurisdiction of the EPA. That MoU has never been revoked. If it has been revoked, please provide evidence of this.
According to the CDC website:
“Regulatory Scope on Additives
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has authority over safe community drinking water, as specified in the Safe Drinking Water Act. . . . In 1979, EPA executed a Memorandum of Understanding with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to establish and clarify areas of authority in controlling additives in drinking water. FDA has regulatory oversight for food additives, which includes bottled water, and EPA has regulatory oversight of direct additives in public drinking water supplies.” https://www.cdc.gov/fluoridation/engineering/wfadditives.htm
If the CDC is lying, again, why don’t you take them to court to establish the truth, once and for all, about this alleged jurisdictional confusion which you claim exists?
This is a nutritional label from Dannon’s Fluoride to Go fluoridated bottled water on which fluoride is listed as a “Mineral Nutrient.” http://www.nutritionvalue.org/Beverages%2C_DANNON_Fluoride_To_Go%2C_non-carbonated%2C_bottled%2C_water_nutritional_value.html
You will not see the word “drug” anywhere on this FDA regulated product. (Again, all bottled water is regulated by the FDA because it is considered a “food,” not because it is considered a drug.) In fact, no Federal agency considers optimally fluoridated water a drug . . not the CDC, not the FDA, not the EPA, not the USDPH, no one. If I am wrong, please provide the example and citation from any Federal agency which has ever said that optimally fluoridated water is a drug.
Your arguments are silly. You say, “And it simply makes no sense to exempt drugs from FDA jurisdiction and then become the jurisdiction of the EPA . .”
Nevertheless, I understand why you would want to raise the level of paranoia about CWF by trying to convince a gullible public that they are being drugged. The more fear you can raise about public water, the more stuff Mercola can sell. Mercola does fund you, doesn’t it? By the way, how much did Mercola give the Fluoride Action Network in 2017? Your lengthy response never got around to answering that question.
Let me illustrate what you are doing here by providing another example: No Federal agency has ever claimed that air is a “drug.” That would be silly, wouldn’t it. Yet oxygen is considered a drug by the FDA which does require a prescription. https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-10386-0_28
According to the logic of your arguments, optimally oxygenated air should be regulated by the FDA because it is a “drug,” since it has oxygen in it.
Again: 1) How much did Mercola fund you last year? 2) Where in the Federal SDWA is water fluoridation prohibited,” & 3.) Why don’t you take these jurisdictional arguments to court where you could actually change U.S. policy instead of making irrelevant arguments on a science blog where your only intent is to raise public paranoia about safe tap water?
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I support David’s question to you – ” How much did Mercola fund you last year?” Obviously, he is referring to the funding of the Fluoride Action network (which you are still listed as the acting director of).
Come on – you must know. What about a bit of transparency.
Of course, much of the information is available – but it takes time to get into the public domain. We know about this funding in past years because of IRS returns.
But what is the current funding situation?
Didn’t somebody say – “follow the money?”
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David,
Thank you for your reply. I have several letters from the EPA. I asked for your email to send some to you, but you have failed to send me your email address. I can’t cut and paste scanned documents here.
Once again, read the SDWA. Go to the source, not those quoting the SDWA. I gave you one reference above. The CDC presents one side of the SDWA Act. Yes, EPA is charged with ensuring clean safe water. However, the SDWA also prohibits the EPA from the addition of anything to water intended for the treatment of humans. And yes, we are in court against the EPA because they are not doing their job in regards to MCLG of fluoride.
The MOU between the EPA and FDA is interesting. Once again, the EPA and FDA have both written letters that the MOU is no longer in effect and never gave EPA jurisdiction over the addition of fluoride to water.
David, we covered these items over a year ago and does not appear you have followed up with direct questions to the EPA and FDA. You refuse to dig deeper into the EPA and FDA jurisdiction . . . that is your choice.
David, you suggest that I’m trying to raise fear an paranoia. No. Not at all. The EPA documents from Dec 2010, Dose Response Analysis and Relative Source Contribution of fluoride are must reads. These are documents and reviews recommended by the NRC 2006 report which unanimously determined the EPA’s MCLG is not protective. 12 years later and the MCLG has not changed to protect the public. Instead, the EPA has considered (2010) to keep the MCLG and declare fluoride less toxic than previously. In other words, the instead of following the recommendations of the NRC 2006 report, the EPA has done the opposite and suggested 0.08 mg/kg bw/day might be safe (instead of 0.06 mg/kg bw/day the current RfD). And then the EPA disregards everyone under 6 months of age, disregards the 10% drinking the most water, raises the RfD, and still determines that about a quarter of children are ingesting more fluoride than the proposed 0.08 mg/kg bw/day.
David, you use a very interesting illustration. Oxygen. Please, please, please read carefully the laws.
INTENT OF USE is key. If the intent of use of the substance is therapeutic or makes such a claim (even a placebo) then the substance is a drug. INTENT OF USE is key. If I made a claim that the “air” I sell will mitigate, cure, treat or prevent a disease, then my “air” is a drug and I need FDA approval.
Because the intent of ingesting fluoride is to mitigate a disease, it becomes a drug. If the intent is to kill pests, it is a pesticide. Different laws regulate the substance depending on the intent of use. See https://www.fda.gov/Drugs/DevelopmentApprovalProcess/default.htm
Also see https://www.fda.gov/Drugs/GuidanceComplianceRegulatoryInformation/default.htm
You asked how much money Mercola gave to FAN. Following the money is important.
Fluoride manufacturers make hundreds of millions of dollars selling fluoride for CWF and industry. If they could not sell for CWF they would have to PAY millions to dispose of the fluoride in a hazardous waste site.
Fluoride is a powerful valuable chemical used in many processes and purposes. Lots of money in each.
CWF is promoted by many big organizations, governments, dental, public health and medical associations. The ADA makes a bundle from fluoride advertisers, dentists can easily make many tens to hundreds of thousands on fluoride treatments. CDC provides funding for fluoride research, etc.
On the other side, Mercola and others did give some money to FAN. Our total budget for the last few years has been about $200,000 a year. How do you think Mercola, I and others profit by giving some money to FAN? Does Mercola sell more of his products as a substitute? No.
So tell me, how does Mercola (or anyone with FAN) profit from reducing excess fluoride exposure? I’ll tell you. He does not make a penny on sales of anything related to lower fluoride consumption.
You raised a red herring and FAKE NEWS. So if he gave $1 or paid for everything with FAN.
Contrast that with the ADA and advertising from the likes of Crest and Colegate Procter and Gamble. Huge money there.
David and Ken, what are your backgrounds in science/law? Where do you make a living and what is your education?
I have been practicing dentistry for 41 years and have a Masters Degree in Public Health. For the first 25 years of practice I promoted fluoridation, I thought I could see the benefit. Then I read both sides of the literature, the laws, and contacted regulatory agencies.
No government agency accepts jurisdiction for CWF. No government agency reviews the science on both efficacy and safety. EPA claims it is a local decision and FDA is deferring enforcement.
It will be interesting to see the EPA response in depositions and documents from the EPA. The scientists at the EPA want to regulate, but the politicians have stopped the scientists. Now the court has agreed to review. I’m very optimistic. And court review will cost us between a quarter to half a million dollars. If you would like to donate and help with legal expenses, see http://www.fluoridealert.org.
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Dr. Osmunson, sometimes in these lengthy discussions the salient points get lost. In order to avoid that here I would like to recap some of the things that have been said.
First, I asked you how much money Mercola funded the Fluoride Action Network last year. You failed to answer that question.
Second, you have said, “The USEPA is prohibited by Congress from adding anything to water for the treatment of humans. Read the SDWA.” I asked you for the specific statute in the Federal Safe Drinking Water Act which prohibits water fluoridation (and I think I’ve asked you three times now). You have failed to provide anything from the SDWA to support your claim.
Third, in your efforts to raise paranoia about safe drinking water, you continually claim that optimally fluoridated water is a drug. I have asked you to please provide an example and citation from any Federal agency (the EPA, the FDA, the CDC, the USDPH, any U.S. Federal Agency) which has ever said that optimally fluoridated water is a drug. You failed to respond to that request.
And fourth, I asked you why you don’t you take these jurisdictional arguments to court where you could actually change U.S. policy instead of making irrelevant arguments on a science blog where your only intent is to raise public paranoia about safe tap water? You did raise the appeal that is currently underway (in California I believe). You asked for a donation for legal fees. So you did answer the question. You make irrelevant arguments on a science blog because you’re looking for legal donations. Fair enough.
Ok, let’s go through these one by one. First, Mercola. Your response is laughable.
Bill: “How do you think Mercola, I and others profit by giving some money to FAN? Does Mercola sell more of his products as a substitute? No.
So tell me, how does Mercola (or anyone with FAN) profit from reducing excess fluoride exposure? I’ll tell you. He does not make a penny on sales of anything related to lower fluoride consumption.”
He does not make a penny on anything related to lower fluoride consumption? Really?
According to this Mercola website which emphasizes the need to filter your household water, “One of the most pernicious toxins in American water supplies is fluoride. While it’s not healthy for anyone, pregnant women and households mixing formula for babies should take extra care to avoid fluoridated water, as bottle-fed babies are at significant risk of getting too much fluoride. Even low doses of this chemical have been shown to alter thyroid function and childhood brain development, and lower IQ in exposed children.
Fluoride is also a mitochondrial poison . . .” And here’s the part I like: “Any simple countertop carbon filter like Brita will not remove it.” By the way, on that same page, Mercola recommends reading “The Case Against Fluoride” by Paul Connet.
https://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2018/01/27/household-water-filtration.aspx
So, when we look at the Whole House water which he sells & recommends, I see that I can save a whopping $548.72 (he calls it “bundle savings”). My price is a mere $1164.97. Interestingly, the replacement tank, which I assume will be necessary in the future, is $649.00.
So, when you ask & answer, “ how does Mercola (or anyone with FAN) profit from reducing excess fluoride exposure? I’ll tell you. He does not make a penny on sales of anything related to lower fluoride consumption,” that’s not exactly true is it. Mercola makes a great deal of money by selling his expensive fluoride reducing filters, filter paraphernalia, and other related gadgets. He also makes money by selling expensive fluoride detox, very expensive fluoride free toothpaste.”
How much money? According to Wikipedia, “The site and his company, Mercola LLC, brought in roughly $7 million in 2010 . .” According to Dr. Stephen Barrett, “Fluoride Action Network (FAN), the leading promoter of misinformation about fluoridation. Its donations are funneled through the nonprofit American Environmental Health Studies Project. https://www.quackwatch.org/11Ind/mercola.html
According to Dr. Barrett, Mercola funds money to the Fluoride Action Network through his tax shelter, the American Environmental Health Studies Project. So not only is Mercola taking advantage of his own tax shelter by putting funding into it, in so doing he is giving money to your FAN so that you can raise the paranoia about optimally fluoridated water which in turn helps him sell his stuff.
Personally, I think you should all be put in jail. Mercola has already received 4 warning letters from the FDA for unethical sales practices. And it is certainly noteworthy to mention that the Fluoride Action Network is part of Mercola’s Health Liberty conglomerate.
Second, the SDWA. You keep making the claim that the Federal SDWA prohibits fluoridation. I am very familiar with the SDWA. I’ve asked you 3 or 4 times now to cite the statute which you believe prohibits CWF. You are either lying or you are repeating what you have heard without doing your own homework. So again, let’s see this prohibition which you claim exists.
Third, in your efforts to raise the level of paranoia about safe tap water, (you know, to help Mercola sell his stuff) you’re trying to convince the public that they are being drugged. Now you’ve got a new definition explaining why optimally fluoridated water is a drug (although no one else agrees with you).
You say, “please read carefully the laws.
INTENT OF USE is key. If the intent of use of the substance is therapeutic or makes such a claim (even a placebo) then the substance is a drug. INTENT OF USE is key. If I made a claim that the “air” I sell will mitigate, cure, treat or prevent a disease, then my “air” is a drug and I need FDA approval.”
Ok, the “intent” makes it a drug. According to the Mayo Clinic, “A high-fiber diet may also help reduce the risk of obesity, heart disease and diabetes.” That’s kind of like – in fact it’s the same thing as – optimally fluoridated water may help reduce the risk of dental caries. The idea of “intent” has the same function is both cases. Therefore, if you claim that optimally fluoridated water is a drug, then you must also claim that when someone eats a diet rich in fiber they are drugging themselves.
According to you and your new definition, beans, apples with skins, pears, oats, almonds, tomatoes, etc., are all drugs if a person eats these fiber rich foods with the “intent” of reducing obesity and the risk of heart disease. https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/nutrition-and-healthy-eating/in-depth/high-fiber-foods/art-20050948
You don’t need FDA approval to sell oatmeal, and again your arguments are laughable.
And as to your odd story that no one is in charge of community water fluoridation, the 1979 MoU between the FDA & the EPA placed the EPA as the regulatory authority over CWF. You know that. That MoU has never been revoked. If you claim that it has been revoked, I would like to see that document. Your letters from attorneys, individual people, or anyone else are irrelevant.
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One more thing. Either you are lying here or you have not done your homework. In either case you are helping to spread an untrue conspiracy theory.
Bill: “Fluoride manufacturers make hundreds of millions of dollars selling fluoride for CWF and industry. If they could not sell for CWF they would have to PAY millions to dispose of the fluoride in a hazardous waste site.”
The truth is that fluorosilicic acid, what we are talking about here, is used for many purposes. These uses include solar panel fabrication, computer chip fabrication, glass etching, and chemical feed stock for producing other chemical products. Fluorosilicic acid is also converted to a variety of useful hexafluorosilicate salts. The potassium salt is used in the production of porcelains, the magnesium salt for hardened concretes, and the barium salts for phosphors. It is also used as an electrolyte in the Betts electrolytic process for refining lead. . . among other things.
So, according to your conspiracy theory, someone hit upon this idea of taking this highly lucrative bi-product, which has many valuable and safe uses, and dumping it into the water supply, and according to you, is poisoning people who drink that water. . . because they thought that would be a better idea than selling it as a product for for its many other uses?
Well . . to your credit, at least you haven’t begun calling it “Soylent Fluoride,” . . . yet.
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David, TO YOUR QUESTION ONCE AGAIN. MONEY
I did answer your question on Mercola. I answered you last year. I answered it in the post above. I’m answering it again. Your question makes no sense.
A. He, and the hundreds of others who donate to FAN, gain nothing with the cessation of fluoridation. So what is the intent of your question? You did not answer. Suppose he gave one dollar or a hundred thousand. Makes no difference. He has no vested interest in FAN and will make no money with CWF cessation.
B. I don’t know how much he or anyone has donated to FAN. Makes no difference. You put a number to it and tell me what difference it makes.
How much money does the American Dental Association make from advertising fluoride products?
How much money do the fluoride manufacturers make selling the chemicals versus a hazardous waste disposal. Many millions.
How much do the public health agencies and insurance companies put into promoting fluoride ingestion? Millions.
How much do cities put into CWF? Hundreds of millions.
In contrast, how much is spent trying to stop excess fluoride exposure? A couple hundred thousand a year.
Follow the money by following the profit. Sales creates profit and money. Stopping sales makes no money.
David, your question does not seem to have an end point of interest or purpose. Spell out what difference donations make to FAN.
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Bill, I asked you how much money Mercola donated to FAN in 2017, last year.
You just said, “I did answer your question on Mercola. I answered you last year. I answered it in the post above. I’m answering it again. Your question makes no sense.”
1.) How could you have answered how much money Mercola donated to FAN in 2017 last year. Last year was 2017.
2.) You did not answer in the post above.
3.) If the question makes no sense, or is irrelevant, why do you think Dr. Barrett gives the issue enough weight to provide Mercola donations to FAN on his website? Why do you think he believes people would be interested in this information? https://www.quackwatch.org/11Ind/mercola.html
You have said that your budget last year is about $200,000. Can you tell me what percentage of that was funded by Mercola? Can you also tell me how much money other businesses who stand to profit from your misinformation donated to FAN last year? For example, can you tell me how much money Canadian based Rocky Ridge Bottled Water Company donated to FAN? Of course any bottled water company stands to profit from the paranoia that you generate about safe tap water.
Also, and again, please provide the statute in the SDWA which prohibits water fluoridation which you claim exists (this is the 4th time I am asking).
And again, please provide any document which revokes the 1979 MoU which gives regulatory authority of CWF to the EPA.
And while you’re at it, please provide any citation from any U.S. Federal Agency which has ever classified optimally fluoridated water a “drug.”
However, I am most interested in Mercola’s funding of FAN which of interest of not only myself, but many others. The question seems to have struck a nerve.
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Bill Osmunson: “How much money do the fluoride manufacturers make selling the chemicals versus a hazardous waste disposal. Many millions.”
You are still lying, Bill. There is no need for an expensive hazardous wast disposal of the Fluoride Agent. Again, The truth is that fluorosilicic acid, what we are talking about here, is used for many purposes. These uses include solar panel fabrication, computer chip fabrication, glass etching, and chemical feed stock for producing other chemical products. Fluorosilicic acid is also converted to a variety of useful hexafluorosilicate salts. The potassium salt is used in the production of porcelains, the magnesium salt for hardened concretes, and the barium salts for phosphors. It is also used as an electrolyte in the Betts electrolytic process for refining lead. . . among other things.
So, according to your conspiracy theory, someone hit upon this idea of taking this highly lucrative bi-product, which has many valuable and safe uses, and dumping it into the water supply, and according to you, is poisoning people who drink that water. . . because they thought that would be a better idea than selling it as a product for for its many other uses?
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David,
I don’t think you are fluent in English, or maybe you don’t read well. This is a cut and paste from above. Slow down and read what is posted.
“B. I don’t know how much he or anyone has donated to FAN. Makes no difference. You put a number to it and tell me what difference it makes.”
Barrett is a Quack. Think for yourself. I asked what difference it made if Mercola donated $1. or $100,000. FAN does not market anything. FAN does not sell anything. FAN does not promote anyone’s product.
I don’t know how much he donated. I have answered your question many times. I don’t know. But it makes no difference. Just because a Quack doctor thinks there is a conspiracy or need the drums to roll, maybe some thinking needs to go into the discussion. What difference does it make how much anyone donates to FAN? They get nothing back, other than a web site which has the largest collection of fluoride research.
Give me YOUR reason for why the amount of money Mercola donates to FAN is important. But you aren’t reading this anyway and will ask the same question, so why should I bother responding?
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SEE [FD&C Act, sec. 201(g)(1)]
AND
A. The SDWA with Cause, Prohibits the EPA from Regulating the Addition of Fluoride to Water for Health Care Purposes.
42 USC 300g-1(b)(11) states:
“No national primary drinking water regulation may require the addition of any substance for preventive health care purposes unrelated to contamination of drinking water.” (emphasis added)
For greater clarification, the EPA was contacted and responded:
“The Safe Drinking Water Act prohibits the deliberate addition of any substance to drinking water for health-related purposes other than disinfection of the water. Decisions on whether or not to fluoridate drinking water are made at a state or local level. (emphasis added)
However, by assuming efficacy of fluoride, the EPA violates the intent of the SDWA and protects the fluoride contaminant based on health care purposes which in practice forces the public to ingest, with harm, excess fluoride. The EPA DRA has NO jurisdiction to adjust fluoride concentration in water based on health–related purposes or determine the safety of the pollutant with a primary over riding medicinal intent.
B. The EPA Could Not Enter Into an MOU With the FDA Which Requires the EPA to Violate the SDWA. If the EPA Did, Then the MOU is Invalid. The MOU Relates to Food and NOT the Addition of Fluoride to Water With the Intent to Prevent Disease, Drugs. (See p 31 Section V these comments)
C. Decisions by States and Municipalities to Fluoridate Drinking Water do Not Exempt Those Governments From Other General Laws Such as Gaining FDA CDER Approval and Licensing the Marketing of Drugs. State Governments Mistakenly rely on the EPA to Determine the Safety of Fluoridation.
D. The EPA Correctly Understands the SDWA’s Charge to Regulate Fluoride Existing in Drinking Water as a Contaminant.
The FDA CDER has jurisdiction, authority and mandate by Congress under 21 U.S.C. 321 CHAPTER II—DEFINITIONS (g)(1) both (a) and (b) to regulate any substance used with the intent to prevent disease, including the fluoride concentration in water. Other drugs are sometimes detected in public water systems. Adjusting the concentration of lithium, penicillin or any other drug with heath-related intent is not within the jurisdiction of the EPA.
Local governments trust HHS and Divisions of HHS and the EPA. HHS, EPA, and the DRA must clear up that mistaken trust. The lack of FDA CDER regulatory action of determining fluoridate concentration in water based on health-related purposes and fluoride supplement manufacturers is the bailiwick of the FDA CDER. The CDC and EPA shall refer manufacturers of the fluoridation drug to the FDA CDER for approval.
E. The SDWA is the Federal Law Intended to Protect Public Water Systems From Harmful Contaminants.
“The Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) is the main federal law that ensures the quality of Americans’ drinking water. Under SDWA, EPA sets standards for drinking water quality and oversees the states, localities, and water suppliers who implement those standards.”
The states, localities and water suppliers in turn rely on the EPA for guidance on water contaminants and on the FDA CDER and Boards of Pharmacy for oversight of the manufacturing of drugs. EPA for contaminants, poisons such as fluoride, existing in water. FDA CDER for concentration of drugs made with water. The DRA’s sole focus must be on safety and not altered by assumptions of efficacy. The EPA does not have jurisdiction to weigh the balance between efficacy and safety and pretend to be a sham FDA CDER with drug regulatory judgment.
The CDC has no authority to approve drugs nor recommend the use of unapproved drugs or formulation of unapproved drugs.
F. EPA Was Not Able to Identify Any Empirical Scientific Data Because the SDWA Does Not Authorize the EPA with Drug Regulatory Approval.
The EPA presented to Congress:
“To answer your first question of whether we have in our possession any empirical scientific data on the effects of fluosilicic acid or sodium silicofluoride on health and behavior, the answer is no.”
G. The EPA Scientists NFFE Amicus Curiae, Appendix DD, is Essential for the HHS, FDA CDER, CDC OFFICE OF WATER AND ORAL HEALTH, and EPA to Carefully Review at This Time. The EPA Scientists have taken the Legal, Moral, and Scientific High Ground.
The EPA professionals have been brutally concise, clear and ethical:
1. “In summary, we hold that fluoridation is an unreasonable risk. That is, the toxicity of fluoride is so great and the purported benefits associated with it are so small – if there are any at all – that requiring every man, woman and child in America to ingest it borders on criminal behavior on the part of governments.”
These EPA scientists appear to be at serious odds with the DRA. It is not too late for Joyce Morrissey, Tina Duke, Dennis Opresko, Annetta Watson, Bruce Tomkins, Brenda Foos, Denis Borum, Lisa Melnyk, Linda Abbott, Mary Fox, E. Angeles Martinez Mier, and/or David Ozsvath to carefully review DRA report in light of laws, science, and ethics, and remove your names, demand the report be corrected, or at least write a minority report.
2. Perhaps the most striking example of the severe polarization between proponents and opponents of the unapproved fluoridated water drug is between the CDC/ADA and the EPA scientists. The CDC/ADA claim fluoridation is safe, effective and necessary for everyone and the EPA scientists claim fluoridation borders on criminal behavior.
3. The EPA scientists (NFFE) testified to the Court regarding the scientific basis for the authorized Recommended Maximum Contaminant Level (RMCL) for fluoride in drinking water.
“. . . NFFE believes that serious errors were made by the Agency in setting the fluoride RMCL . . . the Agency deliberately chose not to base its decision on relevant expertise. . . . The process by which EPA arrived at the RMCL for fluoride is scientifically irrational and displays an unprofessional review of relevant scientific data.”
And the EPA scientists advised the Court:
“Fluoride as a Protected Pollutant The classic example of EPA’s protective treatment of this substance, recognized the world over and in the U.S. before the linguistic de-toxification campaign of the 1940’s and 1950’s as a major environmental pollutant, is the 1983 statement by EPA’s then Deputy Assistant Administrator for Water, Rebecca Hanmer (15), that EPA views the use of hydrofluosilicic acid recovered from the waste stream of phosphate fertilizer manufacture as, “…an ideal solution to a long standing problem. By recovering by-product fluosilicic acid (sic) from fertilizer manufacturing, water and air pollution are minimized, and water authorities have a low-cost source of fluoride…”
In other words, the solution to pollution is dilution, as long as the pollutant is dumped straight into drinking water systems and not into rivers or the atmosphere.” In the 1950’s Harold C. Hodge erroneously suggested it would take a daily dose of 20-80 mg to get skeletal fluorosis. The EPA relies predominantly on biased research from that historical era to set the RfD.
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Ken Perrott made a legitimate request: How about a little transparency.
You yourself said that it is good to follow the money. Does that apply to everyone else except FAN? Aren’t you the Director of FAN? Don’t you have access to FAN’s financial records? Are you saying that you don’t have access to FAN’s records? If so, that is an odd way to run an organization?
What difference does it make how much Mercola financed you? If your organization, with it’s $200,000 annual budget, is dependent on a multi-million dollar, unethical, natural health sales corporation which has already received 4 warning letters from the FDA for its behavior, it makes a great deal of difference. It compromises your motives.
This is your quote: “You asked how much money Mercola gave to FAN. Following the money is important.” That’s what difference it makes.
Is there some reason why you can’t be transparent about this? As the Director of FAN, do you, or do you not have access to FAN’s financial records?
The SDWA. You said, “The USEPA is prohibited by Congress from adding anything to water for the treatment of humans. Read the SDWA.”
I asked for the specific statute which prohibits anything like this. I asked you at least 4 times for that statute. Now I understand why you were so hesitant. You gave me Section B (Public Water Systems), Subsection 11 of the Federal SDWA. And on page 18 we do indeed find this statute which prohibits the Federal SDWA, or any Federal regulation, from REQUIRING the addition of anything for preventive health care purposes. And Fluoride would indeed fall into that category. Here it is:
“(11) No national primary drinking water regulation may require the addition of any substance for preventive health care purposes unrelated to contamination of drinking water.”
Again, for the 5th time, please show me anything from the Federal SDWA which prohibits community water fluoridation. All you gave me is a statute which prevents the Federal government from mandating water fluoridation, or anything like it, on the local level. This statute doesn’t prohibit CWF. Good luck with that in court.
One more thing. Learn to read.
You also gave me a lengthy diatribe from someone, it isn’t signed, there is no name attached, it’s not an official document, it looks like a legal opinion, it could have been written by Charles Manson for all I know, it has no context . . . it is irrelevant. What is that supposed to be? You said you wrote to the EPA and they responded with this? Who responded with this? Is this the official EPA position? And if so, where on the EPA website can I find it?
So again, is there a problem with providing some financial transparency from the Fluoride Action Network? And for the 5th time now, please show me anything in the Federal SDWA which supports your bizarre claim that CWF is prohibited by it.
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One more thing. You said that Barrett (Dr. Stephen Barrett who runs the website “Quackwatch,) is a quack.
I had previously said that according to Dr. Barrett, Mercola funds money to the Fluoride Action Network through his tax shelter, the American Environmental Health Studies Project.
As the Director of FAN, are you publicly saying that this is not true? Are you saying that FAN does not receive money from Mercola through the American Environmental Health Studies Project which Dr. Barrett says is a nonprofit organization?
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Barrett is wrong. I’ve never heard Mercola having anything to do with AEHSP, except he does donate to FAN and AEHSP is the parent organization of FAN. AEHSP is not Mercola’s.
Seems Barrettt gets his information from his gut rather than facts.
And I’m no longer the Director of FAN, but I’m still on the Board.
You asked for transparency and do not seem to have interest in science or laws but rather conspiracy theories and gossip.
I asked you for your background and education, but you have failed to answer.
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David,
You keep asking questions about money and fail to answer my questions about money. How much profit is made from selling fluoride and the claim that fluoride is safe and effective? Many millions.
We are promoting individual choice, freedom from additional chemicals, protection for each person.
On the other hand, you want to take freedom of choice away and suggest everyone needs more fluoride even though you refuse to tell me how much they need or how much they already are ingesting, quality evidence of efficacy or jurisdiction.
Once again I repeat, because you don’t seem to read what I write or post, and I will move on from money, I don’t know how much Mercola or anyone else donates to FAN. I have never asked and don’t need to know because it makes no difference. If FAN were profit centered, the big spenders would be very much of interest. But no one makes a profit off of FAN.
I was Director for over a year and I did not receive any pay from FAN. All my time was donated.
Enough of you wasting time on nonsense. You refuse to talk about the money promoting CWF and how much is spent forcing everyone to drink an unapproved toxic waste. So lets look at jurisdiction and lack of benefit.
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David,
The EPA in several locations confirms they are prohibited from adding anything to public water for the treatment of humans.
I agree with you, the SDWA could be considered vague, but I have asked the EPA and their lawyers and employees confirm, the statute means and EPA interprets the SDWA to prohibit the EPA from adding fluoride to water.
If you don’t agree, contact the EPA.
Then you say the “diatribe” is unsigned. I wrote what you call the diatribe. That’s mine. My name appears on this post and that post and I wrote this and that.
What is your education and background? My god, you are so negative on side issues. What difference does it make who wrote it? If it makes sense, then consider. If it does not, then find out why.
Back to Barrett. Read carefully. You are missing so much by reading without thinking.
David writes, “Are you saying that FAN does not receive money from Mercola through the American Environmental Health Studies Project which Dr. Barrett says is a nonprofit organization?”
Please, never try to paraphrase me. . . or for that matter, don’t quote me because you will take it out of context. Don’t try to put words in my mouth. Read what I write. Quote me with a date, but don’t try change what I wrote.
I keep saying that I don’t know how much anyone donates to FAN. As Director, I looked at the big picture, not individual donations. And I never asked whether or how much a person donates to FAN. No reason to ask, just not an issue. No one had influence over me or the Board because of money. I did not do anything or make any decisions with Mercola or anyone else because of any donations. No one controlled me. As far as I know, you could be the biggest donor to AEHSP/FAN. No purpose in asking or knowing or wasting time finding out.
Clearly David, you do not seem to either have been a Board member of a not for profit 501c3, or perhaps your organizations obeyed the direction of the donors. If so, then you should have lost your 501c3 status.
You probably have heard organizations like NPR say that they will send a gift, water bottle, T shirt, hat or something if you donate a certain amount. Several of our donors would send those things back or tell us not to send anything as a thank you gift because such gifts can be seen as payment and need to be reported to the IRS.
We have some very honest people with great integrity in the world. Lets be sure we are included in that group.
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B.O.: “We have some very honest people with great integrity in the world. Lets be sure we are included in that group.”
Resonse: Wow! You sound like great people. Could you please tell me how many times Paul Connett has traveled to the South Pacific during harsh North American winters, paid for by donations from people whom you have convinced are being poisoned by their local governments? How many times has William Hirzy accompanied him? Have they taken their families with them?
Just asking.
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What does Paul’s travels have to do with CWF benefit or toxicity?
David, you are certainly strange.
The only expense Paul has made which FAN has paid for, I have personally approved. I think his budget for travel, food, lodging is about $2,000/year. My memory is that in Paul received a $1,000 for partial payment for one trip to NZ/AUS. I don’t remember the time of year. He did go more than that but he raised the money, travel, food, and lodging outside of FAN. Frequently Paul travels paid by various governments to speak on waste treatment. Then he uses frequent flyer miles or specific donations from the country where he goes. My memory is that his trips have been to Ireland, Scotland, Italy, NZ, AUS. Probably other trips I don’t know about.
David, do you find Paul’s travels worth discussing? Scandalous? Does his travel schedule prove CWF is effective or safe or make it legal?
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You also played detective asking how many times Hirzy or family members have gone also. I think Ellen went once, but FAN did not pay for any of her expenses. Hirzy did not go to my memory.
Again, trying to answer your most ridiculous questions. But I don’t find you have answered any of mine. I don’t find you to be a friendly cordial sharing person. You don’t even tell me your education, employment or why you have an interest in CWF. I’m interested.
As you know, I’ve been practicing dentistry for 41 years, masters in public health, two son-in-laws in dentistry, an Optometrist daughter and country western star daughter. My wife is a nurse. I’m a member of the IAOMT and IABDM. But I’m not a groupie follower. I’m a pilot, flight instructor, multi engine rated. My hobbies are snow skiing, construction, and flying. My 96 year old mother lives with us and my dad is in a care facility recovering from a bladder/kidney infection. Religion . . . was SDA now atheist. Politics. . . opposed to bullies, racist, abusive people who think they are kings, dictators and above the law. I grew up in Kenya for 7 years, went to school in Austria for a year, and worked in Canada as a dentist for 4 years. Now you know much of my life history. How about you?
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Well, I must say, I find this ironic to say the least. When Dr. Perrott wanted to discuss the science, you wanted to discuss the FDA, the EPA, the SDWA, why you think optimally fluoridated water is a drug (although no one else agrees with you), what a contaminant is, Washington State Law . . . Now all of a sudden, when I ask questions about what FAN does with its money, you say, “What does Paul’s travels have to do with CWF benefit or toxicity?”
So now you want to discuss the science? Is that correct? In that case I defer you back to Dr. Perrott.
However, before I do, since I like to discuss the money, I has asked, “Could you please tell me how many times Paul Connett has traveled to the South Pacific during harsh North American winters, paid for by donations from people whom you have convinced are being poisoned by their local governments?”
And I admit, I didn’t know the answer to that question before I asked it. You said, “The only expense Paul has made which FAN has paid for, I have personally approved. (And you were the director of FAN for one year? Correct) I think his budget for travel, food, lodging is about $2,000/year. My memory is that in Paul received a $1,000 for partial payment for one trip to NZ/AUS. I don’t remember the time of year. He did go more than that but he raised the money, travel, food, and lodging outside of FAN.”
Just like when I asked you how much Mercola donated to FAN in 2017, you don’t know. The answer is at least 5 times (and I’m not counting 2016, when went in July). http://fluoridefree.org.nz/dr-connett-speaking-tour-2011/ (2011) March & April . . . http://fluoridefree.org.nz/dr-connett-speaking-tour-2013/ (2013) February. . . http://fluoridefree.org.nz/dr-paul-connett-speaking-tours/ (2014) February. . . . http://fluoridefree.org.nz/dr-connett-speaking-tour-2015/ (2015) February. . . http://fluoridefree.org.nz/prof-paul-connett-speaking-tour-2016/ 2016 July. . . http://fluoridefree.org.nz/prof-paul-connett-speaking-tour-2018/ 2018 February. February would be a great time to get to the Southern Hemisphere, wouldn’t it.
He does like to travel doesn’t he. I see that he’s been to Tuscany a few times (the first in 1996 – which had nothing to do with you), he’s been to Australia, Canada, Germany, Ireland, Israel, Japan, New Zealand, & the U.K. And I’m not even doing an in-depth search. I just picked these countries off of one of his tour-posters, so I’m sure there is more.
So I asked you how many times these trips to the South Pacific were “paid for by donations from people whom you have convinced are being poisoned by their local governments?”
You said, “I don’t remember the time of year. He did go more than that but he raised the money, travel, food, and lodging outside of FAN.”
According to you, the answer is Every Time.
Oh, and thank you for your personal information. If it’s not too much trouble, I would also like to know the name of your first pet, the name of your 4th grade teacher, the color of your first car, favorite movie, date of birth, social security number, and a few credit card numbers, Visa if possible, and be sure to include the expiration date and that weird funny 3-didget number on the back. Thanks.
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Oh, I almost forgot. Your quote: “Hirzy did not go to my memory.”
Ahh . . the old ‘I can’t remember,’ response.
“Dr Paul Connett and Dr William Hirzy Speaking Tour 2015” http://fluoridefree.org.nz/dr-connett-speaking-tour-2015/
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David. We were talking about last year.
However, I can’t speak for everyone in this world or everyone associated with FAN for periods of time throughout their life. I don’t know and am not interested
You are a tabloid type of person and have no real interest in science.
Your intent is to trip me up on the history of the world where it makes no difference to the science. Very unprofessional.
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David,
I did not have time or want to debate Ken on his blog at his time on his subject, in part because I don’t have time and I do not trust his professionalism.
It is true I wanted to work on jurisdiction and dosage before risk.
Clearly, neither you nor Ken are practicing prescribing clinicians. As tabloid debaters, it is a waste of time to give you years of medical/dental training to get you up to speed. But once again, I will try to start with basics.
The problem I have with you and Ken, is you don’t read what I post and if you read you don’t understand. Let me try again even more basic and simple.
The basics are extremely important to grasp before more complex issues are built on the basics. Sort of like most learn to talk before they learn to read. We build on the basics.
When it comes to substances intended to prevent or treat disease, prescribing clinicians understand the basics.
First, the persons must be a patient of record. We can’t prescribe drugs to just anyone. It is unethical to write a prescription to a stranger or write a prescription for everyone in town as a mass treatment, i.e. CWF.
Second, we, as legal intermediaries between the patient and the manufacturer, need to do an exam on the patient and a diagnosis. If a chemical substance or drug/medicine is indicated, we ask the patient if they are allergic to the medication or have had side effects to the medication or if they are already taking the medication and how much are they taking. We rely to a great extent on the FDA and manufacturer’s dosage recommendations and legend. The legend is where the FDA has approved the warnings for adverse reactions, we see that on TV advertisements to some extent.
Only after we know how much the patient is already getting does the prescribing clinician add to that amount based on weight, health and good judgment.
Lets apply those basics to CWF. I have repeatedly asked you and Ken,
“How much fluoride is the patient ingesting?” No response.
“How much should the patient ingest?” No response.
Until those two questions are answered, we can’t really discuss safety. Remember, everything is toxic, the dose creates the toxin.
The regulatory scientists at the FDA have determined the science on efficacy is incomplete.
David and Ken, you are CWF pushers, you want me to ingest more fluoride? How much more will benefit me? How much am I getting? And then we need to discuss, “is that amount safe?”
But no. You don’t want to start at the beginning because you don’t have a clue how much I’m getting or how much I need. You simply want to talk about potential secretes and hidden agendas.
Simply a waste of time.
However, David, you keep changing your question to try and make up a story. The question was specifically about FAN payment for Paul’s travel to the South Pacific, and I understood it to be while I was FAN Director.
Don’t change the question and expect that I have answered it. Previous years, I don’t know. Paul has made many trips, but not at FAN’s expense. Paul does not receive any financial compensation for his time and neither did I.
If you ask a question and I answer, stick to the question and don’t assume I answered other questions you drum up.
But you still have not been professional and answered my questions.
What is your educational background? I presume you did not go to school and I will try to communicate as such. I don’t know Ken’s education, I presume chemist, but he has not responded to my question either.
Don’t refer me to Ken for science. If you promote CWF because of a simple belief in Ken’s opinion, then CWF is a religion for you, not based on facts.
You want other people to medicate you with additional fluoride and you need to get the facts on the science before you give up your freedom of consent and accept/promote the drug.
Remember, 60% of children in the USA now show a biomarker of excess fluoride exposure with 2% severe and 20% moderate. NOT GOOD.
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Bill Osmunson: “The problem I have with you and Ken, is you don’t read what I post and if you read you don’t understand. Let me try again even more basic and simple.”
Response: I’ve read everything you’ve written. You may have noticed that many times now I have copied & pasted certain passages that you have written so that my response to them could be more easily understood. I was able to do that because, you know, I read it first.
Think
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Dr. Osmunson, you seem intent on learning all about me. I have already told you that I have a full understanding of the Federal SDWA. I will also tell you that I have a working knowledge of that document in a professional capacity. That is the only relevant thing you need to know about me. I don’t wish to discuss where my mother lives, or what my hobbies are.
You may remember that I jumped into this discussion asking about FAN’s money. Don’t act offended now because I have asked about how a former Director of FAN spends the hard-earned money donated to him by believers that you have helped to create.
That being said, there is one basic problem with most of your arguments, whether it be your claim that CWF is illegal, your claim that a Memorandum of Understanding made in 1979 between the FDA & the EPA has no legal weight, or your bizarre claim that people who drink optimally fluoridated water are “patients.” Optimally fluoridated water is not a drug, and almost all of your arguments rest upon that false premise.
No one, other than you and your organization, believes, or says, that it is. The CDC doesn’t believe it, the FDA doesn’t say it, the EPA doesn’t believe it, no one other than FAN makes this claim. Moreover, I have already debunked your claim (that optimally fluoridated water is a drug) in this comment and you have chosen not to defend it. See argument beginning at paragraph 16 https://openparachute.wordpress.com/2017/09/21/fluoride-pregnancy-and-the-iq-of-offspring/#comment-115340 Your argument not only has no merit, it no longer exists.
That being said, your comment: “First, the persons must be a patient of record. We can’t prescribe drugs to just anyone. It is unethical to write a prescription to a stranger or write a prescription for everyone in town as a mass treatment, i.e. CWF.”
Irrelevant. Optimally fluoridated water is not a drug. We have already established this.
Your comment: “Lets apply those basics to CWF. I have repeatedly asked you and Ken,
“How much fluoride is the patient ingesting?” No response.
“How much should the patient ingest?” No response.”
First of all, there are no patients. There are no drugs, and there are no doctors. When a person brushes his teeth he is not a patient. You lose credibility because of this stale scare-mongering tactic.
How much fluoride is the patient ingesting? First, there is no patient. However, if we are talking about drinking optimally fluoridated water, that would depend on how much water is drunk. At 0.7 ppm, if a person were to drink one liter of water, 0.7 ml of fluoride would have been consumed.
How much should the patient ingest? First of all, there is no patient. There is someone drinking a glass of water. Nevertheless, since optimally fluoridated water has been shown to put a minute amount of fluoride in saliva which continually bathes and remineralizes the teeth, a person should drink optimally fluoridated water on a regular, continual basis.
How much would be too much? There can be no “too much.” This question is irrelevant, since there has never been one documented case of any harm to any human being because they drank optimally fluoridated water, even for as much as a lifetime. Would you like to get back to basics? This is what we call empirical evidence. Empirical evidence is the basic foundation of science.
A human being would die of water toxicity before any harm could occur from the fluoride in it. If I am wrong, please cite one documented case in which any human being has ever been harmed in any way because they drank optimally fluoridated water, even for as much as a lifetime. And, please cite the successful lawsuit that would have naturally followed because a local government put something harmful in its citizens’ water and made them sick. If anything would merit a lawsuit, it would be that.
Bear in mind that the U.S. is so lawsuit-crazy that even the world’s most successful fast-food chain was successfully sued because its coffee was too hot. Bear in mind also that more people drink optimally fluoridated water in the U.S. than any other place in the world.
So, let’s see the empirical evidence of harm to any human being. Let’s see the lawsuit that would have naturally followed.
Your comment: “But no. You don’t want to start at the beginning because you don’t have a clue how much (fluoride) I’m getting . .”
Response: I know you’re not getting too much, because you are not physically able to drink that much water.
Your quote: “The question was specifically about FAN payment for Paul’s travel to the South Pacific, and I understood it to be while I was FAN Director.”
Response: Why would you understand that? I don’t know when you were FAN’s director. The question was specifically asked about his trips which were QUOTE, “paid for by donations from people whom you have convinced are being poisoned by their local governments?” UNQUOTE
Again. Learn to read.
Your quote: “Don’t refer me to Ken for science. If you promote CWF because of a simple belief in Ken’s opinion, then CWF is a religion for you, not based on facts.”
Response: That’s a laugh. I am being far more polite to you than I have been with Ken when we disagree on other topics. Ken will be the first to tell you that his opinion carries little weight with me.
Your quote: ” then CWF is a religion for you, not based on facts.”
CWF is a religion for me? Your anti-fluoride position is a religion with you. You have been proven wrong about your claim that the Federal SDWA prohibits CWF, and still you believe. Your claim that optimally fluoridated water is a drug has been debunked by me, and still you believe. You have pushed the false conspiracy theory that manufacturers of fluorosilicic acid save millions by dumping it into the water supply rather than paying for its disposal. You were lying. I have debunked that lie, and still you believe.
You will never NOT believe, no matter how many times you are proven either wrong or lying. You are not a scientist, you are a devotee/leader of a fringe cult.
When I see someone lying to push an agenda I don’t need a religion to form an opinion. Common sense tells me that if he is lying about one or more things, he is likely to be lying about more than that.
Ok. Here’s your golden opportunity. I will the first to change my opinion about CWF if you can provide me with one documented case of any person who has ever been harmed by drinking optimally fluoridated water, even for as much as a lifetime, and provide a citation or link to the successful lawsuit that would have naturally occurred because a local government intentionally “poisoned” the water of its citizens.
It’s that simple.
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David,
I have read your posts and sounds like you have read mine. Your last post is more reasonable and I will cover it in detail. The reason I am wanting to know your back ground is the kind of evidence you might have interest in. For example, as a high school student, I might need to cover more basics. As a water treatment operator, dentist, MD, chemist, lawyer, I would use different evidence. When I use quotations here, it is cut and paste from your statements above.
“Dr. Osmunson, you seem intent on learning all about me. I have already told you that I have a full understanding of the Federal SDWA.” David, Major problem. No one fully understands the SDWA. The best source is the EPA/Congress/Courts and that is even being hammered out in court. Please consider the EPA’s position and understanding of the SDWA. You and I may think the SDWA says one thing and the EPA interprets it differently. If you carefully look at what the EPA lawyers state and how the EPA has responded in the past, you should come to the understanding that the EPA is charged with making the water “SAFE.” The EPA does not determine efficacy, effectiveness of anything added to water with the intent to treat people. The EPA never says they have determined fluoride is effective at a specific dosage or concentration. In contrast, the FDA is required to first consider the evidence of effective and then they look at safety.
David continues, “I will also tell you that I have a working knowledge of that document in a professional capacity. That is the only relevant thing you need to know about me. I don’t wish to discuss where my mother lives, or what my hobbies are.”
Bill responds, Actually, hiding behind anonymity is neither professional nor scientific. If you are not willing to put your identity to your words, then you really don’t believe in what you are saying. I have nothing to hide and will tell you about myself. By the way, the Director of FAN does not spend the money. I had no check signing authority and I could authorize up to $1,000. Spending by FAN is done by the Board.
David continues, “That being said, there is one basic problem with most of your arguments, whether it be your claim that CWF is illegal, your claim that a Memorandum of Understanding made in 1979 between the FDA & the EPA has no legal weight, or your bizarre claim that people who drink optimally fluoridated water are “patients.” Optimally fluoridated water is not a drug, and almost all of your arguments rest upon that false premise.”
Bill responds, OK. sounds like the core disagreement we have is jurisdiction as a therapeutic agent. Who has responsibility to determine efficacy, dosage, safety. Do you feel the EPA is in charge of determining the effectiveness of fluoride ingestion? Remember, that is the issue I started out with. We have gone full circle to the core issue.
1. Read your fluoride toothpaste label. Read a non-fluoridated toothpaste and it does not say, “DRUG FACTS.” Read the FDA Red Book, ask the FDA, indeed, fluoridated toothpaste is FDA approved and is called a “Drug.” Do you dispute the FDA? Can we agree that the FDA regulates fluoride in toothpaste?
The question becomes, if fluoride is a drug in toothpaste and a drug with supplements, when diluted in public water with the same intent, is it exempt from FDA regulatory approval? The EPA legal office says NO, that the FDA has jurisdiction. The FDA in legal jargon says the EPA has jurisdiction. The CDC does not have jurisdiction to approve any substance, they simply market policy and the dental division is highly influenced by industry, ADA.
2. You raise a good point on the EPA/FDA MOU. I just read it again and confirmed fluoride or CWF is not mentioned. When I called the EPA for clarification, the person who worked on it was still working at the EPA. I failed to get in touch with him because my lawyer was able to get further clarification from the EPA/FDA lawyers. The EPA regulates contaminants in water. Fluoride concentration is permitted at 4 ppm MCL, Maximum Contaminant Level. Fluoride is a contaminant. Adding fluoride to water is contaminating water. What is the intent of contaminating water? Essential to understand because “intent” determines jurisdiction. A few years ago, the MOU was rescinded.
If the EPA had jurisdiction over substances added to water with the “intent” to prevent disease, the EPA would have scientific evidence on benefit, dosage, legend, etc. EPA has no scientific evidence of efficacy. Not only does EPA have no science on efficacy, they do not have authority from Congress to evaluate efficacy. EPA has authority to determine safety of the contaminant but not efficacy.
David comments, “No one, other than you and your organization, believes, or says, that it is.” Actually there are other organizations such as IAOMT, IABDM, AAEM, and 97% of Europe which does not fluoridate, some because ingestion of fluoride is not effective and not approved for ingestion with the intent to prevent disease.
David Comments: “The CDC doesn’t believe it,” Actually, the CDC does not have authority to approve fluoride ingestion. They rely on like minded believers and the ADA. David, we should be dealing with science, not belief. Fluoridation ingestion should not be faith based.
David: “the FDA doesn’t say it,” The FDA testified to Congress that fluoride is a drug. The FDA requires label on fluoride toothpaste and says, “Do Not Swallow.” Their level of concern is 0.25 mg of fluoride, the same in a glass of CWF.
David: “the EPA doesn’t believe it,” The EPA scientists have been very firm and said fluoridation is no longer effective, if it ever was. They also say CWF boarders on a criminal act of government. Again, David, science is not a faith based system.
David: “Moreover, I have already debunked your claim (that optimally fluoridated water is a drug) in this comment and you have chosen not to defend it. See argument beginning at paragraph 16 https://openparachute.wordpress.com/2017/09/21/fluoride-pregnancy-and-the-iq-of-offspring/#comment-115340” David, you have a strong faith based system, but quoting yourself does not add evidence. Please send me any documentation you have that CWF benefit is determined by EPA or CDC or any other government organization.
David: “That being said, your comment: “First, the persons must be a patient of record. We can’t prescribe drugs to just anyone. It is unethical to write a prescription to a stranger or write a prescription for everyone in town as a mass treatment, i.e. CWF.” Irrelevant. Optimally fluoridated water is not a drug. We have already established this.
I too felt the EPA had jurisdiction until I contacted all agencies with FOIA requests and talked to their scientists. I am unable to find any Congressional direction or internal government documents that exempts a substance listed in the Pharmacopia, listed by the FDA as a drug, used with intent to prevent disease, which is exempt from FDA approval because it is diluted in water. Please provide evidence from the EPA that they approve the addition of fluoride to water. They don’t. They guide those who chose to fluoridate, but they do not fluoridated water.
When Robert C. Thurnau, Chief, Treatment Technology Evaluation Branch, Water Supply and Water Resources Division, US EPA National Risk Management Research Laboratory, November 16, 2000 was asked by Congress about the science on fluoride, he responded, “To answer your first question of whether we have in our possession any empirical scientific data on the effects of fluosilicic acid or sodium silicofluoride on health and behavior, the answer is no.”
The EPA scientists when speaking through their Union, said, “In summary, we hold that fluoridation is an unreasonable risk. That is, the toxicity of fluoride is so great and the purported benefits associated with it are so small – if there are any at all – that requiring every man, woman and child in America to ingest it borders on criminal behavior on the part of governments.”
The EPA scientists testified in court, “. . . NFFE believes that serious errors were made by the Agency in setting the fluoride RMCL . . . the Agency deliberately chose not to base its decision on relevant expertise. . . . The process by which EPA arrived at the RMCL for fluoride is scientifically irrational and displays an unprofessional review of relevant scientific data.”
And the EPA scientists advised the Court:
“Fluoride as a Protected Pollutant
The classic example of EPA’s protective treatment of this substance, recognized the world over and in the U.S. before the linguistic de-toxification campaign of the 1940’s and 1950’s as a major environmental pollutant, is the 1983 statement by EPA’s then Deputy Assistant Administrator for Water, Rebecca Hanmer (15), that EPA views the use of hydrofluosilicic acid recovered from the waste stream of phosphate fertilizer manufacture as,
“…an ideal solution to a long standing problem. By recovering by-product fluosilicic acid (sic) from fertilizer manufacturing, water and air pollution are minimized, and water authorities have a low-cost source of fluoride…”
My biggest concern is the lack of any agency accepting jurisdiction CWF. For example, Mr. Neugeboren Associate General Counsel of the Water Law Office of the EPA responded to my attorney Gerald Steel, EPA does not have jurisdiction over artificial fluoridation (adding fluoride to water.)
On the other hand, HHS Secretary Wanda Jones (2014) denies Jurisdiction over CWF, “FDA has determined that Congress did not intend for the FDA to regulate the addition of fluoride to public drinking water for dental caries prevention as a drug under FD&C Act.
And in contrast, the EPA 2013 the EPA states, “Under the SDWA, EPA is the lead federal agency with responsibility to regulate the safety of public water supplies. EPA does not have responsibility for substances added to water solely for preventative health care purposes, such as fluoride. . . . The HHS acting through the FDA remains responsible for regulating the addition of drugs to water supplies for health care purposes.”
OK David, are you beginning to see my concern. You may read the law one way and I another. However, so does the EPA and FDA. Meanwhile, water districts, cities, and public health officials THINK someone has jurisdiction over determining both safety and efficacy. However, both agencies who should be responsible (EPA AND FDA) are denying jurisdiction. Big problem. These agencies are like greased pigs. Slippery devils.
David: “Your comment: “Lets apply those basics to CWF. I have repeatedly asked you and Ken,
“How much fluoride is the patient ingesting?” No response.
“How much should the patient ingest?” No response.”
David said, “First of all, there are no patients. There are no drugs, and there are no doctors. When a person brushes his teeth he is not a patient. You lose credibility because of this stale scare-mongering tactic.”
Bill’s response: OK, CWF adds a contaminant to water with the intent to treat the customer, do we agree? Do you prefer the word drug (FDA) or contaminant(EPA)? You pick the word. The FDA and all applicable laws and all health care providers agree, when a person/customer is treated with a substance to prevent a disease, they are a patient. Call them what you want. No doctor could ethically prescribe fluoride for ingestion without the patient being a person of record. Shall we call them a customer? Not really, because there is no consent. You pick the word.
David Continues: “How much fluoride is the patient ingesting? First, there is no patient. However, if we are talking about drinking optimally fluoridated water, that would depend on how much water is drunk. At 0.7 ppm, if a person were to drink one liter of water, 0.7 ml of fluoride would have been consumed.”
Bill responds: OK David. Now you are starting to talk about science. Good. If a person drinks 1 liter of CWF water, they would get 0.7 mg of fluoride from the water (assuming 0.7 ppm F which is now more common than 1 ppm in the USA). Of course some drink bottled water or almost no water and some drink over 10 liters of water a day. In other words, dispensing fluoride in water does not reasonably administer individual dosage of fluoride ingested because the amount of water swallowed is not the same. I would send you EPA graphs if I knew your email address. But you have refused. And remember, there are many sources of fluoride in foods, chemicals, air, etc.
Remember, David. FDA is concerned with ingesting 0.25 mg of fluoride and a warning not to swallow. CWF at 0.7 mg is almost three times that amount of fluoride “on average” and assuming no other fluoride ingestion.
However, we have just started to touch on CWF dosage problems. The “customer’s” age is a huge problem. For example, mother’s milk has no detectible fluoride in most samples. Most babies breast feeding would ingest no fluoride. But if formula were reconstituted with CWF, the baby would ingest perhaps 0.7 mg of fluoride. FAR higher than mother’s milk, especially considering the size of the baby. Dosage is milligrams per kilogram of body weight. So babies are being given far to much fluoride. And where are the studies to show that babies benefit from ingesting fluoride and mother’s milk is deficient in fluoride? In other words, where are the studies that CWF is superior to breast feeding? None. Zero. We are not discussing the quality of the study, we have NO studies that CWF is superior to breast feeding. The absence of evidence is not proof of efficacy or safety, but in CWF is based on faith.
And the EPA DRA RDC does not even consider children under six months of age. And the EPA confirms about a quarter to a third of children under six are ingesting too much fluoride even if they changed the RfD and ignoring the 10% of the population drinking the most water and all infants.
David continues: “How much should the patient ingest? First of all, there is no patient. There is someone drinking a glass of water. Nevertheless, since optimally fluoridated water has been shown to put a minute amount of fluoride in saliva which continually bathes and remineralizes the teeth, a person should drink optimally fluoridated water on a regular, continual basis.”
Bill responds; OK, you prefer the term “someone” rather than patient. Probably better than customer which implies the person has is considering or chosen to purchase.
What evidence do you have the minute amount of fluoride in saliva reduces caries? CDC disagrees. What is the difference in saliva concentration of fluoride over 4 hours between drinking CWF? Should be simple to test and report with an RCT study. Please provide. And then, what concentration of fluoride in the tooth prevents the caries? Teeth with or without caries have the same fluoride concentration ranges. So we don’t even know how much fluoride in the tooth is optimal.
David continues: How much would be too much? There can be no “too much.” This question is irrelevant, since there has never been one documented case of any harm to any human being because they drank optimally fluoridated water, even for as much as a lifetime. Would you like to get back to basics? This is what we call empirical evidence. Empirical evidence is the basic foundation of science.”
Bill responds: Actually there are many cases of harm from CWF. 2% of the USA population has severe dental fluorosis, according to the latest reported NHANES survey, 2010. Severe dental fluorosis is an adverse effect–harm.
David continues: A human being would die of water toxicity before any harm could occur from the fluoride in it. If I am wrong, please cite one documented case in which any human being has ever been harmed in any way because they drank optimally fluoridated water, even for as much as a lifetime. And, please cite the successful lawsuit that would have naturally followed because a local government put something harmful in its citizens’ water and made them sick. If anything would merit a lawsuit, it would be that.
Bill responds: I just did provide the reference, NHANES 2010-2011 2% of children now have severe dental fluorosis, 20% moderate. Case studies of harm have been frequently reported, I can send you case studies. CDC data with NHANES survey is more scientific.
David: Bear in mind that the U.S. is so lawsuit-crazy that even the world’s most successful fast-food chain was successfully sued because its coffee was too hot. Bear in mind also that more people drink optimally fluoridated water in the U.S. than any other place in the world.
Bill: How many people successfully sued the paint manufacturers and gasoline manufacturers for excess lead exposure? Law suits do happen, but not as often against cities and water districts. But they are coming. And how do you prove in court a child has lower IQ because they ingested lead (or fluoride)? Several sources of those contaminants.
David: So, let’s see the empirical evidence of harm to any human being. Let’s see the lawsuit that would have naturally followed.
Bill: NRC 2006 unanimous agreement, severe dental fluorosis is an adverse effect of too much fluoride ingestion. 2010-2011 NHANES reports 2% of children have severe dental fluorosis. That would translate to several million children harmed.
David: Your comment: “But no. You don’t want to start at the beginning because you don’t have a clue how much (fluoride) I’m getting . .” Response: I know you’re not getting too much, because you are not physically able to drink that much water.
Bill: Sounds like you assume drowning would be the first sign of too much fluoride? Actually, you are basing your assumption on faith, not toxicology. I have not seen anyone fall over dead from lead or fluoride. That does not mean no one has ever been harmed.
Your quote: “The question was specifically about FAN payment for Paul’s travel to the South Pacific, and I understood it to be while I was FAN Director.”
Response: Why would you understand that? I don’t know when you were FAN’s director. The question was specifically asked about his trips which were QUOTE, “paid for by donations from people whom you have convinced are being poisoned by their local governments?” UNQUOTE
Bill: To that question above, my response would be never. I assumed you meant when I was director. Sorry, misunderstood. And because I don’t know who I have convinced CWF adds too much to their intake of fluoride, then I would respond “never.” FAN does not pay for very much travel. They did not even pay my way to the FAN Conferences.
DAVID: . . . . CWF is a religion for me? Your anti-fluoride position is a religion with you. You have been proven wrong about your claim that the Federal SDWA prohibits CWF, and still you believe. Your claim that optimally fluoridated water is a drug has been debunked by me, and still you believe. You have pushed the false conspiracy theory that manufacturers of fluorosilicic acid save millions by dumping it into the water supply rather than paying for its disposal. You were lying. I have debunked that lie, and still you believe.
Bill: So who should I give the most credence to? You or Congress? You or the EPA? You or the CDC? You or the FDA? You or research? Sorry, but you have not told me where you work or your credentials or your last name or anything about you. And now you want me to have faith in you? What are you smoking kid?
David: . . . .When I see someone lying to push an agenda I don’t need a religion to form an opinion. Common sense tells me that if he is lying about one or more things, he is likely to be lying about more than that.
Bill: If you want me to trust you at a higher level than the Federal and state Governments, then you need to build that trust with me. Your anonymity does not build trust or credibility. Give me evidence and I will consider. At the same time, don’t call me a lier just because you don’t agree. Maybe you don’t know what I know. I’m willing to examine your evidence if you present it.
David: Ok. Here’s your golden opportunity. I will the first to change my opinion about CWF if you can provide me with one documented case of any person who has ever been harmed by drinking optimally fluoridated water, even for as much as a lifetime, and provide a citation or link to the successful lawsuit that would have naturally occurred because a local government intentionally “poisoned” the water of its citizens.
It’s that simple.
Bill: NHANES is a good starting point for you. We have reasonably good surveys of dental fluorosis in the USA. These surveys, unlike most in other countries which examine a few teeth, examined all the teeth in the mouth for dental fluorosis.
You ask for proof, but have not given proof of safety. And your “challenge” is bogus. No one drinks only CWF. They swallow toothpaste, eat fluoride in foods, pesticides, post harvest fumigants, and much more. Perhaps one third to two thirds of total fluoride ingestion comes from CWF.
My proof is too many are ingesting fluoride. Perhaps synergistic chemical reactions? Perhaps more exposure? We don’t know why so much more dental fluorosis. But we do know, too many are ingesting too much fluoride.
I have to run to a patient.
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Sorry, Bill, you blew it.
I asked you for one documented example of harm to any human being because they drank optimally fluoridated water, even for as much as a lifetime. You responded with:
“NHANES is a good starting point for you. We have reasonably good surveys of dental fluorosis in the USA. These surveys, unlike most in other countries which examine a few teeth, examined all the teeth in the mouth for dental fluorosis.”
That is not one documented example of harm.
I asked you for a citation or a link to the lawsuit that would have naturally followed from a local government intentionally putting something in its citizens’ water and making someone sick. You responded with:
“How many people successfully sued the paint manufacturers and gasoline manufacturers for excess lead exposure? Law suits do happen, but not as often against cities and water districts. But they are coming. And how do you prove in court a child has lower IQ because they ingested lead (or fluoride)? Several sources of those contaminants.”
That was not a citation or a link to a lawsuit that has occurred because someone was harmed by drinking optimally fluoridated water. Which is odd, because I believe you said you had the largest library of fluoride literature in the world. If answering a simple historical question should be easy for anyone, it would be you.
Nevertheless, it’s a good thing the people of Flint, Michigan don’t share your pessimism. You’ve had over 70 years to come up with a successful lawsuit because of physical harm. In Flint, the lawsuits were flying in less than a year.
How do you prove in court that a child has lower IQ because they ingested lead (or fluoride)? Good question. According to a report from The Guardian, “Outside a hearing in Washington DC last month, Flint native Tammy Loren, 36, said her four children – all boys, aged 10 to 14 tested positive for elevated blood lead levels. One of her children has a cognitive learning disorder, attention-deficit disorder, and registered the highest lead level among his siblings: 23 micrograms per deciliter of blood.”
So, the way this works, the children of Tammy Loren, of Flint, Michigan, would be documented examples of people who were physically harmed because they drank lead-contaminated water. The Class Action Lawsuit, of which she is a part, would be the lawsuit which naturally followed the event.
There is far too much in your comment to respond to. I would like to, but I don’t have the time or the energy, it would get lost anyway, and you would be convinced of nothing. Much of what you said is wrong, I’m not certain that you are completely sound. It would be a waste of time.
Nevertheless, you blew your golden opportunity.
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David,
You ignored most of what I wrote.
After America was certain our children were ingesting too much fluoride it took almost a century to get the law suits going.
You are talking like public health policy should be developed determined in the courts. Lawyers are usually not the best toxicologists and judges should not be put in that spot.
And how many published peer reviewed studies did Tammy Loren who was harmed, provide giving proof of excess lead exposure? I am repeating my point that you think the “someone” is supposed to provide the empirical evidence of proof of harm, rather than the manufacturer selling the product. The person harmed is not required to do the research on CWF. The manufacturer is required to provide the proof of safety.
And David, you seem to get mixed up between the difference of harm and lethal dose. A chronic sub lethal dose is not necessarily safe.
I agree with you, a person would drown drinking water before they would die of too much fluoride from CWF. Is death the only concern you have? Did Tammy Loren die from the lead in the water?
My point is, until you know the dose of fluoride which does not cause harm, you can’t say a specific dose is safe. And you need to know the amount of fluoride from all sources, total exposure.
1. How much F is a person getting?
2. How much F should a person get?
3. If they are lacking, then how much fluoride is needed?
But first you must answer those basic questions.
If you like reading EPA documents, such as the SDWA, be sure to carefully review the NRC 2006 report which instructed the EPA to do a Dose Response Analysis and a Relative Source Contribution. Those three documents will give you some interesting answers to the three questions I pose above.
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Ooops. I used the wrong word. I said, “After America was certain our children were ingesting too much fluoride it took almost a century to get the law suits going.” and should have said lead, not fluoride.
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Actually, you said, “Law suits do happen, but not as often against cities and water districts. But they are coming.” . . “After America was certain our children were ingesting too much fluoride (and you meant lead) it took almost a century to get the law suits going.”
No, in fact after the City of Flint was certain their children were ingesting too much lead, it took less than a year to get the lawsuits going. After 70 years, I still haven’t seen one successful lawsuit because someone was harmed because they drank optimally fluoridated water, even for as much as a lifetime.
I didn’t ignore most of what you said. I simply don’t have the time or energy to re-debunk everything you have said. You will never change your opinion no matter how many times you are proven wrong. See what I mean? I’ve already said this once before.
I gave you one golden opportunity to convince me that my position on CWF was wrong. You failed. I asked you to show me only one documented case of any person, just one person, who has ever been harmed in any way because they drank optimally fluoridated water, even for as much as a lifetime. And I asked you to show me the lawsuit that would have naturally occurred because a local government intentionally poisoned its citizens’ drinking water. And that would indeed merit a lawsuit . . as we are seeing in Flint. (I asked for the successful lawsuit because that would verify documentation of harm.) I wasn’t asking for a lethal case, as you seem to be saying, I’m just asking for harm.
You couldn’t even show me one person who was harmed because they drank optimally fluoridated water. You failed. We’re done.
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The NHANES 2011-12, USA, National survey, funded by HHS, reports 60% of children have at least some degree of dental fluorosis. 20% have moderate and 2% have severe. NRC 2006 unanimously agreed severe dental fluorosis is an adverse effect, harm.
David, I gave you over half a million harmed. Thats many more than one.
People harmed don’t always sue. And just because they sue, does not mean they were harmed. Better to look to the scientists for harm.
I can give you individual cases, but a single case study is not as powerful as an individual case, unless you or your loved one is the case.
Here is a court case: https://www.epa.gov/sites/production/files/2017-02/documents/tsca_fluoride_petition.pdf Kyle Adams is one of the plaintiffs.
The case has not finished in the courts. However, if the judge determines the EPA’s MCLG is not protective, as the National Research Council has determined and CWF is not protective, will that be strong enough evidence for you to agree CWF has harmed someone?
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David, also note there are more than a thousand dentists and physicians represented by their professional associations who are part of the TSCA law suit focused to stop CWF because too many are ingesting too much fluoride and are being harmed.
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Dr. Osmunson, I asked you for one documented case – only one – of any human being who has ever been harmed in any way by drinking optimally fluoridated water, even for as much as a lifetime. And I asked for the successful lawsuit that would have naturally occurred because a local government put something harmful in its citizens’ water.
You did indeed respond: “Here is a court case: https://www.epa.gov/sites/production/files/2017-02/documents/tsca_fluoride_petition.pdf Kyle Adams is one of the plaintiffs.”
Since this is a response to my request, it is reasonable to assume that this document has something to do with the ailments allegedly suffered by Kyle Adams. But it doesn’t does it. Nowhere in this document are the ailments of Kyle Adams to be found. You lied by implying that this document had anything to do with harm caused to Kyle Adams, didn’t you.
Kyle Adams? Where have I heard that name before? Would that be the son of Audry Adams? As I recall he was suffering from seizures, temper tantrums, I think he was a werewolf at one point, demonic possession. Yeah, that’s right. You already copy/pasted his story in this same thread, right here https://openparachute.wordpress.com/2017/09/21/fluoride-pregnancy-and-the-iq-of-offspring/#comment-96909 . . and here https://openparachute.wordpress.com/2017/09/21/fluoride-pregnancy-and-the-iq-of-offspring/#comment-96911 . . and here https://openparachute.wordpress.com/2017/09/21/fluoride-pregnancy-and-the-iq-of-offspring/#comment-96923
This is how I already responded: “Dr. Bill Osmunson.
It really does not get any better than this!!! You truly are the gift that keeps on giving.
Twice in this thread, just prior to your last series of comments, I accused you of being a Shill for Mercola (you know, because Mercola funds you, and it’s bottom line is improved by the paranoia that you try to push).
This is the part of “Kyle’s story” that I enjoyed the most:
“After all those months of bottled water sponge baths, I finally found a shower filter on http://www.mercola.com that, while it makes no claims to do so, removes enough of the fluoridation chemicals for Kyle to be able to shower IF we do all 4 of these things: . . . .
“I hope you’ll help FAN put a halt to water fluoridation by giving generously.” https://openparachute.wordpress.com/2017/09/21/fluoride-pregnancy-and-the-iq-of-offspring/#comment-96983
“Kyle’s Story” is an advertisement for Mercola Shower Heads which claim to filter out fluoride.
This is your quote, isn’t it: “ I asked what difference it made if Mercola donated $1. or $100,000. FAN does not market anything. FAN does not sell anything. FAN does not promote anyone’s product.” https://openparachute.wordpress.com/2017/09/21/fluoride-pregnancy-and-the-iq-of-offspring/#comment-115348
That’s another lie from you, isn’t it. FAN does promote Mercola’s products. You promoted Mercola’s filter showerheads when you copy/pasted “Kyle’s Story.”
In an effort to provide one documented case of harm to anyone because they drank optimally fluoridated water, you also said, “The NHANES 2011-12, USA, National survey, funded by HHS, reports 60% of children have at least some degree of dental fluorosis. 20% have moderate and 2% have severe.”
You are saying there is more moderate dental fluorosis today than there was in, say the 1960s or 70s. That may be true, but it is irrelevant. Do you know how kids get moderate dental fluorosis? They eat toothpaste. Do you know what we have today that didn’t exist in the 1960s of 70s? Manufacturers of children’s toothpaste came up with the great marketing idea of tailoring toothpaste flavors to what kids might like. That way, it would be easier for parents to get them to brush their teeth. So, today we have cotton-candy flavored toothpaste, grape flavored, bubble-gum flavored, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (looks like a toy), Watermelon Burst.
Do you see where I’m going with this? Doesn’t it stand to reason that because kids’ toothpaste is more appealing, that more kids are getting ahold of it and eating it, which they should not do?
You also said, “NRC 2006 unanimously agreed severe dental fluorosis is an adverse effect, harm.”
Did the NRC, or did anyone for that matter, agree that severe df is an adverse effect of drinking optimally fluoridated water? No. They did not. The fact that you presented this as an argument against optimally fluoridated water is another lie on your part.
Speaking of your lies, on what page of this document by Michael Connett will I find anything that has anything to do with harm caused to Kyle Adams from optimally fluoridated water. The answer, of course, is nowhere. Any Court who looked at that hogwash would laugh and throw it out of court.
You also said, “there are more than a thousand dentists and physicians represented by their professional associations who are part of the TSCA law suit focused to stop CWF because too many are ingesting too much fluoride and are being harmed.”
Is that just in the U.S., or worldwide? Let’s assume they are just in the U.S.
In 2015, there were 195,722 practicing dentists in the United States. In 2013, there were over one million doctors of medicine all over the United States. You said, there were more than a thousand dentists & physicians who were part of this lawsuit. That is about what you would find on FAN’s list of Professionals who have signed the Opposition to Fluoride Statement, which lists 581 MDs, 378 Dentists (which is odd, because you said over 1000. You would think each and every one of them would have signed the FAN’s Statement.)
So you must also be including Chiropractors (629) which gives us a total of 1588. Let’s say 1588 Drs. & Dentists are part of this lawsuit. That represents 1 percent, and the reality, undoubtedly, is even lower than that since the totals I presented were from several years ago, I rounded up to get your 1588, and I rounded down.
To put that in perspective, according to a recent survey, just under 20% of U.S. citizens believe in alien abductions. https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/new-survey-shows-nearly-half-of-americans-believe-in_us_59824c11e4b03d0624b0abe4 Just under 20% of a total believe in a whacked-out-nut-job conspiracy theory that has no rational credibility. You’re telling me that less than 1% of a total believe optimally fluoridated water is harmful.
What was your point again?
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