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Fluoride Awareness Week Update

Analysis by Dr. Joseph Mercola Fact Checked


 

 

 August 02, 2020

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STORY AT-A-GLANCE
 Over the past 20 years, the Fluoride Action Network (FAN) has
facilitated the removal of fluoride from the water supplies of
hundreds of communities across North America, Canada, Europe,
Australia and New Zealand. This week, we’re helping FAN raise
funds to continue their efforts to eliminate water fluoridation
worldwide

 I will match all donations, dollar for dollar up to $25,000, given to this
important cause during our annual Fluoride Awareness Week

 In 2017, the Fluoride Action Network (FAN) and coalition partners


filed a lawsuit challenging the EPA’s denial of their petition to ban
the deliberate addition of fluoridating chemicals to U.S. drinking
water. They presented their case before the judge June 8, 2020

 A landmark U.S. government-funded study published in 2017 found a


strong relationship between pregnant women’s exposure to
fluoride and the subsequent IQ of their offspring. The higher the
fluoride levels of the urine of the women (a measure of their total
exposure to fluoride regardless of source), the lower the IQ of the
children

 A 2019 study found a nearly 300% increase in ADHD prevalence in


adolescents in Canadian communities with fluoridated water
supplies, compared to those living in nonfluoridated communities

Dr. Mercola Interviews the Experts


This article is part of a weekly series in which Dr. Mercola interviews
various experts on a variety of health issues. To see more expert
interviews, click here.

As every year during our annual Fluoride Awareness Week, Fluoride


Action Network (FAN) founder Dr. Paul Connett is here to provide us
with a progress update. FAN has been instrumental in reducing fluoride
exposure in North America and in many countries throughout the world
over the past 20 years.

As in previous years, we ask that you consider donating to this worthy


organization that is spearheading the daunting task of eliminating water
fluoridation around the world. As usual, Mercola.com will match your
donation, dollar for dollar, up to $25,000 during Fluoride Awareness
Week.

Fluoride Lowers Children’s IQ


From the very beginning, one of Connett’s driving concerns was the
possibility that fluoride might be lowering children’s IQ.

“Two Chinese studies were published in 1995 and 1996, in


English. I was very concerned, and felt strongly that if there
was any evidence that fluoride lowered intelligence of
children, then there's no way you would put benefits to teeth
above that and continue water fluoridation,” Connett says.

Ten years later, in 2006, the National Research Council looked at the
toxicology of fluoride.1 At that time, there were six IQ studies and, based
on those six studies along with many animal studies, the NRC
concluded that fluoride did in fact pose a threat to the brain. By 2008,
there were 18 such studies.

In 2012, a distinguished team, partly from Harvard University, did a


review2 of 27 IQ studies; 25 from China and two from Iran. Strikingly, 26
of the studies showed children with higher fluoride exposure had lower
IQ than the children with lower fluoride exposure.

“The bombshell came in 2017. Up to that point, we had


about 60 studies that had shown a lowering of IQ, most of
them from China, but also some from India, some from Iran,
some from Mexico,”  Connett says.
US-Funded Study Confirms Decades’ Long
Suspicions
The bombshell study3,4 Connett refers to, known as the “Bashash study”
(named after the lead author, Morteza Bashash, Ph.D.), was funded by
the National Institutes of Health, the National Institute of Environmental
Health Sciences and the Environmental Protection Agency.

It followed pregnant women and their babies for 12 years. They


measured the fluoride in their urine, which reveals total exposure,
regardless of the source or sources, and they found a strong
relationship between the fluoride level in mothers’ urine and IQ scores in
their children at the ages of 4, and between 6 and 12.

It’s important to realize that it’s not the concentration of fluoride in the
water (measured in mg per liter) that is significant for health. What
matters is the dose you get in milligrams per day, and the dosage
(mg/day divided by the individual’s body weight), and these depend on a
variety of fluctuating factors.

“The NIH is a parent of the Public Health Service, so they've


been promoting fluoride for years and years (since 1950). So,
I believe they put a lot of money into this study thinking that
it would prove, once and for all, that crazy people like me and
others were absolutely wrong about the notion that fluoride
lowers IQ in children.

But lo and behold, they gave us very, very strong evidence


that it is. And that the most susceptible age, as far as
fluoride's impact on the brain, is during fetal development.

It turns out the placenta does not protect the fetus from
fluoride, and, as you know, up to about six months of age, the
blood-brain barrier is not fully formed in the baby. So, the
fetus is very susceptible to this impact of fluoride.”
The first response of the American Dental Association was that the
findings didn’t apply to the United States, since it was done in Mexico
City. However, this ignored the fact that human beings are human
beings, by measuring fluoride in the urine they had a measure of total
exposure, regardless of the source. It really doesn’t matter if the fluoride
comes from water, other beverages, food or toothpaste.

Canadian Researchers Confirm ‘Bombshell’ Results


In 2019, the NIH study was replicated in Canada,5 and they too found
that higher fluoride levels in maternal urine were associated with lower
IQ in their offspring. The only major difference was that based on
maternal urine levels only boys appeared to be affected, not the girls.
But when the mothers’ fluoride exposure was calculated from ingestion
(i.e. from food and beverages) there was a relationship between that
and the children’s IQ for both boys and girls,

“Now, this study, unlike the first one, the Bashash study, got
a certain amount of coverage,”  Connett says.  “[It] was
published in the journal of the American Medical
Association, Pediatrics. That's one of the major pediatrics
journals in the world, and the editors of this journal went to
extreme lengths.

They knew this was controversial. Hats off for them to take it
on. They knew it was going to be consequential, so they
doubled up on the peer review process, they double checked
the statistics, so they were confident when they launched it.
They even ran an editorial saying the steps they'd taken.
They had two of their editors, the editor of JAMA in total and
the editor of JAMA Pediatrics did a 20-minute podcast
explaining how astounding the results were. They said, ‘Oh,
we had no idea that fluoride caused any problems to health.’
I don't know what they'd been reading. But anyway … it was a
bombshell for them to suddenly find that fluoride could be
damaging the brain of the fetus.

They also ran an editorial from David Bellinger, one of the


world's experts on lead's neurotoxicity, and he said ‘The
measurements here are akin to what's happening with lead.’
In other words, it’s very, very serious, and that got a lot of
coverage around the world.

But the other side was organized and they quickly got some
‘experts’ — none of them actually experts on fluoride or
toxicology or neurotoxicity — who said all the right things to
dampen people's concern about this study.”

Two Other Important Studies


“There are four studies that people need to know about,” Connett says.
To learn more about each, see Connett’s video commentaries on
FluorideALERT.org FAN.tv page. Aside from the two already mentioned,
the two other ones are:

 The Riddell study, published in 2019, found a nearly 300%


increase in ADHD prevalence in adolescents in Canadian
communities with fluoridated water supplies, compared to those
living in non-fluoridated communities. “Science never stops,”
Connett says. “You have to entertain the notion that an ugly fact
can destroy a beautiful theory, in this particular case, we got a lot of
ugly facts, but the big one is the fact that fluoride could damage
children's brains.”
 The Till study, which compared the IQ of children who had been
bottle fed as babies in fluoridated communities (and thus would
have gotten fluoridated water in their formula) versus non-
fluoridated communities. Here, they found a large IQ difference.

FAN Lawsuit Against EPA on Fluoride Underway


November 22, 2016, a coalition including FAN, Food & Water Watch,
Organic Consumers Association, American Academy of Environmental
Medicine, International Academy of Oral Medicine and Toxicology,
Moms Against Fluoridation and several individuals, filed a
petition6,7 calling on the EPA to ban the deliberate addition of
fluoridating chemicals to U.S. drinking water under Section 21 of the
Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA). 

As explained by Connett, the TSCA allows citizens and


nongovernmental organizations to petition the EPA to remove toxic
substances found to pose a threat (an unreasonable risk) either to the
general population or a subset of that population.

The petition was made on the grounds that a large body of research
demonstrates fluoride is neurotoxic at doses within the range now seen
in fluoridated communities, and included over 2,500 pages of scientific
documentation detailing these health risks. 

The EPA denied the petition8 February 27, 2017, on the grounds that it
had failed to present “a scientifically defensible basis” to conclude that
anyone had in fact suffered neurotoxic harm as a result of fluoride
exposure. In response, FAN and its coalition partners filed a lawsuit in
the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, legally
challenging the EPA’s denial of their petition.

This interview was taped June 2, 2020. FAN was scheduled to begin
arguments in front of a judge June 8. FAN will explain the neurotoxicity
of fluoride shown in these and other studies, and then the EPA’s
industry experts, paid consultants who have also defended glyphosate
and other toxins, will present their evidence. (see FAN’s web site
FluorideAlert.org for a summary of the trial)

“But we have, for our lawsuit … some of the leading experts on


neurotoxicity in the world,” Connett says, “including a couple that were
involved in the studies I've been talking about.” That includes Bruce
Lanphear, the EPA’s go-to person for information about the
neurotoxicity of lead. Lanphear worked with Till on the JAMA Pediatrics
article and the bottle feeding study listed above. Howard Hu, lead author
of the Bashash study, is another expert FAN witness, as is Philippe
Grandjean.

“I am very optimistic. [The EPA] doesn’t have the science.


We do. And not only do we have the science, but we have
some of the world's best experts testifying for us. So, unless
these crafty lawyers for the EPA are able to muddy the
waters, I think we'll have no trouble in demonstrating three
things: One, that the preponderance of evidence that fluoride
is neurotoxic is overwhelming.

Second, that it is a risk at the levels at which we add fluoride


to the water. And thirdly, it's an unreasonable risk. Because
even if your number one focus was reducing tooth decay,
there are other ways of delivering fluoride, instead of this
ridiculous notion of putting it in the drinking water and
forcing it on your whole population.

I think we can demonstrate those three things. And I'm happy


to tell you that my son, who started our webpage in 2000 and
developed the largest health database in the world, bigger
than other fluoridating governments, by the way, is going to
be the lawyer fighting this case,”  Connett says.

You can now view the transcript of Michael Connett's brilliant summary
statement
The End of Water Fluoridation Is Inevitable
If victorious, the EPA will likely appeal, as this is a classic stall tactic.
“There's no agency in the United States that is better at dragging its feet
on controversial issues,” Connett says.

“They dragged their feet for over 18 years on the


reassessment of dioxin, an issue I was very close to, and
they still didn't resolve the issue. They're very subject to
industry pressure, and their way of resolving issues is just
delay, delay, delay.

But, I do believe that if a federal court, having heard both


sides, declares that fluoride poses an unnecessary risk, an
unreasonable risk to the developing brain of our children,
that that news will ricochet around the fluoridating world —
Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, Canada, Israel, Malaysia, and
a few other countries where they still fluoridate. It's going to
have a huge impact.

And I think the citizens will be able to use this as ammunition


to say to their health departments, ‘Come on. Why are you
doing this? Why are you doing this when you've got this
scientific information … done by top notch scientists. Why
on earth would you continue this practice when you know
that if you want fluoride, you can simply brush it on your
teeth and spit it out. What is your rationale for continuing
this?

By the same token, to the professional bodies, to the AMA,


the ADA, the APHA and all those other organizations that
have endorsed fluoridation for years and years and years,
why would you continue to support this? Why would you
reveal to the public that you have no scientific credibility?

That you don't read the science, that you don't keep up with
the science on an issue like this? When you're going to the
public and saying again and again and again that fluoridation
is safe and effective, when you've got this evidence right
there in front of you?

One more thing … Possibly the most important agency for


reviewing the toxicology of toxic substances is the National
Toxicology Program (NTP). Back in 2016, FAN asked the
NTP to do a systematic review of the neurotoxicity of
fluoride. This was before the court case and before we went
to court.

After three and a half years they came back, having reviewed
all the animal data and the human data, and in their draft
they said, ‘Based upon the literature, the presumption is that
fluoride is a neurotoxic substance. Based upon studies done
on children in several different countries, the presumption is
that it is neurotoxic.’

Not that it's definite; but you would have to presume, based
upon all the literature, that this is a neurotoxic substance. So,
that’s a huge vindication for our case. But, because it's a
draft and not a final version, we can't actually use it in the
court case. Still, this is very useful for us going forward, in
addition to whatever the court rules.”

Ending Water Fluoridation Still Met With Strong


Resistance
While FAN has successfully ended water fluoridation in many areas, it’s
still very difficult. One of the reasons for this is because those who want
it to continue always point to reviews by government agencies “which,
as bogus as they are and unscientific as they are, carry a lot of weight,”
Connett says.

In Ireland, they refer to the expert committee. In New Zealand, they refer
to the ministry of health and in Australia to the National Health and
Medical Research Council. In the United States, they refer to the Centers
of Disease Control and Prevention.

All of these agencies have promoted water fluoridation and are not
good judges of whether there are problems or not. Hopefully, a court
win against the EPA will facilitate and speed up the process of getting
fluoride out of drinking water. A win would also set another important
precedent:

“We've been able to bring this to court under the Toxic


Substances and Control Act, which has a clause [stating]
that any group or individual can petition the EPA to remove,
to ban, any particular use of a particular chemical in the
United States if they can show it's an unreasonable risk to
the population, or even a subset of the population.

We … along with Food & Water Watch are the first groups to
ever do this. So, it's establishing a very important precedent,
which is really worrying the chemical industry. It’s a big
concern of ours, because behind the scenes I'm sure they're
trying to muddy the waters in every way they can. But it's a
huge precedent. I hope that our victory will also shoot
adrenaline into the veins of all these other [health safety]
groups …”

Another Fluoride-Related Issue To Be Tackled


In our interview, Connett also discusses the fluoride pollution released
during recycling of lithium ion batteries, such as those used in electric
cars. Lithium ion batteries contain fluorinated polymers like
polyvinylidene difluoride (PVDF) and an electrolyte called lithium
hexafluorophosphate (LiPF6).

When heated during the recycling process, these fluorinated


compounds break down to produce hydrogen fluoride, and many
fluorinated byproducts which are toxic and difficult to capture. Like
PFOS, these chemicals stick around for so long they’re known as
“forever chemicals.”

As it happens, a lithium ion battery incinerator is being built near


Connett’s home, across the road from a residential area and adjacent to
a little league baseball field. “It is an absolutely insane, unethical siting,”
Connett says, noting that there really is no safe place for such facilities.
It’s the recycling process itself that needs to be modified, which is what
Connett is fighting for now.  

“What this has done is fortuitous. It has brought together


nearly all the strands of our activism. I've had 35 years
fighting incineration and dioxins [and] 24 years fighting
fluoridation. Now we're meeting hydrogen fluoride and
fluorinated by-products in spades. At the very least the
problem will be: What do you do with the sodium fluoride
that's left over in the effluent, the waste water?

I hope someone doesn't suggest putting it in the drinking


water. Because also in that waste water you'll have a PFAS, a
polyfluorinated alkyl substance (used in some of the
batteries), and my wife has spent many, many years
maintaining a database on these PFAS … She's been
concerned with that for a long time. So, we've been able to
draw on three different strands of our activism to help our
local community.”

Avoid Fluoride to Optimize Your Health


Eliminating water fluoridation will go a long way toward protecting the
health of all people, but especially children. Sacrificing children’s brain
function for a theoretical benefit of less tooth decay is unconscionable.

Aside from making sure you do not drink fluoridated water, or use
fluoridated water to mix infant formula, to reduce your exposure, avoid
drinking excessive amounts of tea, which tends to be high in fluoride.
“Mix it up,”  Connett says.  “If you must drink tea, then drink
tea, drink coffee, drink herbal tea. Mix it around. Not too
much tea. Also, avoid animal bones. Don't eat the bones
from sardines and pilchards. Don't eat the bones from
chicken. Avoid mechanically deboned meat.”

Call to Action — Donate Today!


Again, for more details on the four studies Connett highlights in this
interview, see his video commentaries on FAN.tv page. There you can
also find a webinar lecture by FAN’s senior scientist, Chris Neurath, in
which he explains the neurotoxicity of fluoride. To help spread the word,
you can print out a FAN pamphlet to share with family, friends and local
community bulletin boards.

In closing, if you’re concerned about the health effects of fluoride,


please support FAN with your tax-deductible donation today.
Mercola.com will match your donation, dollar for dollar, up to $25,000
during Fluoride Awareness Week.

 

 

 

- Sources and References

 1 National Research Council of the National Academies 2006, page 205


 2 Environmental Health Perspectives 2012 Oct; 120(10): 1362–1368
 3 Environmental Health Perspectives September 19, 2017; 125(9)
 4 Fluoride Alert September 19, 2017
 5 Environmental Health Perspectives October 10, 2018
 6 EPA Petition November 2016
 7 Fluoride Alert November 30, 2016 Press Release
 8 Office of the Federal Register February 27, 2017

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