Some further notes on fluoridation

From the March, 1961 issue of Prevention magazine. The publishers of this magazine have graciously granted us permission to reprint the following article. The title is ours. Original title: On the fluoridation front.

The November 1960, elections (U. S. A.) brought rejections of water fluoridation in 29 communities, according to U.S. News and World Report for December 5, 1960. The measure was defeated by margins ranging from 24,000 votes in Cincinnati to 1 vote in Weyauwega, Wisconsin. Saginaw, Michigan, defeated the proposition for the second time; Freeport, Illinois, for the third; Faribault, Minnesota where fluoridation had been in effect by order of city council, voted to discontinue.

No ill effects from fluoridation?

How often have you heard it "There are absolutely no ill effects on any member of the community as a result of drinking fluoridated water." Here is one explanation of how such a statement is arrived at in a letter to the editor of the Canadian Medical Journal for September 10, 1960. Says C. P. Harrison, M.D., of British Columbia, "In general, it works like this: A cursory examination of the vital statistics of the fluoridated area is undertaken. None of the diseases statistically listed is credited to the consumption of fluorides. It is not surprising then that there is no increase in these diseases in the fluoridated area, but this allows the statement to be made, 'No deleterious effects of fluoride have been found.' This is really a statement of ignorance as to whether or not there are any deleterious effects of fluoride, but, unfortunately, being ignorant is no bar to being positive, and quite illogically, the statement is changed to read, 'It has been found that there are no deleterious effects from the ingestion of fluoride ion.'

"What little we know of the physiological effects of the fluoride ion does not redound to its credit. We know that it affects the enzyme systems and that it is cumulative in the soft tissues as well as bone, but no clear-cut symptom has been established. We cannot establish early toxic effects of fluoride unless we know precisely what to look for. Possibly, in the dosage suggested, fluoride is not harmful, but surely it is incumbent upon us to prove its harmlessness from our knowledge of the action of the fluoride ion before we recommend it to the public.

A victory on the legal front

In July, 1960, a St. Louis county judge decreed that fluoridation was illegal –that an ordinance authorizing fluoridation was invalid and unconstitutional. He called fluoridation "an unwarranted and unjustified invasion of the liberty guaranteed the plaintiffs and others under the United States Constitution." He also decided that fluoridation is contrary to the Missouri state constitution and the St. Louis county charter. "The plaintiffs," he said, "are deprived of the liberty of deciding whether they want to apply fluorine to their teeth for the purpose of preventing tooth decay." He went on to say that "while tooth decay may be termed a disease, it is not contagious in any way and in no way endangers the public health in the sense that its existence in the teeth of one individual might adversely affect personal health in another individual. If fluorine is the key to dental health, and, as the evidence shows, fluorides are readily available to all who desire them, it appears that through proper education and persuasion, the people would accept application of fluoride and would not have to be compelled to be subjected en masse to fluoride."

A war of attribution in Chicago Hearings on an injunction suit to halt fluoridation of Chicago's water have been under way for the last two years. The suit seeks to halt fluoridation which was begun in Chicago in 1956. A total of 2,403 pages of testimony had been taken by mid-summer in 1960. Injunctions have been a weapon of anti-fluoridationists in many localities. This is a legal step taken to delay activity or decision until further facts are known a way to gain time. The Chicago anti-fluoridationists are putting up a valiant fight. In these thousands of pages of testimony are the words of many of the outstanding anti-fluoridation scientists, doctors and researchers of our time. When all the tesimony is taken this will become a valuable record.

You might, however, use this Chicago situation in another way in your local fluoridation fight. Ask the pro-fluoridationists on your city council if they want a situation like this in your community an investigation that drags on month after month or even year after year. Most communities would choose to avoid it, we believe.

Why do people object to fluoridation?

An article in the Journal of the Florida Dental Association for Summer, 1959, reviews the findings of a survey done in Northampton, Massachusetts, to discover who was opposed to fluoridation and why. Says the author, Delmar R. Miller, D.D.S. ... The attitude of a large percent of anti-fluoridation voters on interrogation, seemed to be based on a deep-rooted suspicion of the scientific groups and individual scientists who favored fluoridation. They expressed fear that the United States Public Health Service and the American Dental Association were engaged in a conspiracy with large monopoly interests, in this county. The impression that professional proponents of fluoridation were to profit from the program in some devious underhanded way was rampant....

If such an attitude is impossible for Dr. Miller to comprehend, let us help him out a bit. One of the foremost promoters of fluoridation (he tours the country with unlimited funds apparently at his disposal) is Dr. A. P. Black, Professor of Chemistry of the University of Florida. Dr. Black's son owns a business which sells fluoridation equipment. Now, certainly there is nothing "devious or underhanded" about the benefits Dr. Black hopes to reap from widespread fluoridation. They are quite obvious and out in the open for all to see.

Dr. James Cox, outstanding fluoridation promoter from Pittsburgh, is Professor of Dental Research at the University of Pittsburgh. Financing of academic life at the University of Pittsburgh is inevitably involved with the Mellon interests which are certainly closely tied in with the aluminum business. And fluoride is a by-product of the aluminum industry. Nothing "devious or underhanded" about the arrangements. It is all in the open.

The department of Dr. Frederick Stare at Harvard School of Public Health was recently the recipient of more than a million dollars as a financial grant from a food company, many of whose food products are under sharp attack by independent researchers as being contributory causes of tooth decay. It is not very hard to figure out why Dr. Stare of Harvard would be on the side of the fluoridationists, now, is it? Nothing underhanded or devious the announcement of the million dollars in "payola" appeared in the New York Times...

We think it is the most encouraging development we have yet encountered that Americans are at last waking up to the fact that the "experts" should be listened to only so long as there is no incentive (financial or career-wise) involved in the scientific decision they are required to make. A man who foresees his livelihood or career being destroyed if he makes a statement for or against a new concept in health, is not very likely to be objective in making the decision - scientist or no scientist. Our researchers today are so involved in financial obligations that they have almost ceased being scientists.

Finally, what is so surprising about intelligent people who are suspicious when scientific "experts" tell them that, in order to give medicine to a certain small segment of the population, the entire population must take it?