Oh no, then you’ll lose your connection to your soul!
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There are zero cases of “too much fluoride” in municipal water. It is the best way to treat entire populations. Leave this to individuals, I am guessing, you’d see similar numbers as no fluoride in the water. If you have/had children you probably know the daily battle to brush teeth…
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John Birch Society: Next Gen is running the Republican Party, and they have Cambridge Analytica and Russian trollies for that.
(Literally next gen in the case of Donald and the Koch Bros.)
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OMG - I have so many of those cards in a box somewhere. The art was meh, but it was a fun game.
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My dad had a discussion about this with a dental student while my dad was in college. Essentially, you would have to drink ten gallons a day, every day for it to start doing damage, at which point the water itself would have killed you first. But the dental benefits are real.
Hell, there’s a deadlier poison in municipal water (that being chloramine) but I guarantee you don’t want to stop that one, either. If you do, I suggest you read up on cholera until you change your mind.
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Sadly Oregon is deep in the anti-vax bullshit.
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Flouridated water protects against bone fracture in the elderly, friend.
Update: Since I last checked the literature the consensus is back to mixed on this one.
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It does? Sources? My (limited) reading on the subject indicted it was not clear it either way, but maybe there’s better research since then?
I truly, really hate to be ever be on the same side of any argument as the John Birchers and Ant-vaxxers, but the Fluoride issue always struck me as ineffably odd. Putting toxic waste into drinking water to make teeth stronger and whiter seems like a poor trade-off.
Most countries don’t fluoridate their water and there are (according to the sources I have read - I don’t claim to be a public health expert) no statistical differences in rates of tooth decay between them and the US. I guess I’ve never seen having glowing white teeth as the be-all and end-all of healthiness. I’d rather it was a choice rather than forced on all of us here in the US
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Difference being, Portland has never fluoridated, due to the nature of their water source. Having the setup (like Juneau) then ditching it is…different.
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Peace On Earth. Purity Of Essence.
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“Toxic waste?” Please cite academic sources that fluoride is added to municipal water systems by routing of fluoride-bearing effluent? Or are you evoking “toxic waste” as rhetorical Scary Words™? Do you describe baking soda or table salt as “toxic waste,” although both are produced directly and as byproducts of industrial processes?
Also dental health is upstream of cardiovascular health. Periodontal disease (protected against by fluoride in water) causes one’s risk of dying younger to increase. You are trivializing a critically important public health good.
Revisiting the review literature since the last time I checked on the bone fracture link, the consensus seems back to mixed with lots of uncertainty (mostly studies linking fluorine to bone loss are examining levels of exposure several times that in recommended water fluoridation policies). There’s plenty of in-country studies of rates of bone fracture in regions differing by water fluoridation, but results are negative, or contradictory.
I do claim to be an expert on public health (although I don’t research fluoridation).
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Yeah good point… It’s always been that way, so the locals in Portland probably know how to get fluoride in their diet (if they want it). I would also guess that Portland residents are generally wealthier than people in Juneau, so they can afford to take care of their teeth on their own. Regulating fluoride in the public water source is a good way to reach the entire population, even those without dental care. But it’s their water- they can deal with it as they choose.
ETA: I checked and the median incomes are about the same.
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I’m not an organic chemist - although I do have a background in geochemistry
This is what struck me “NaF is prepared by neutralizing hydrofluoric acid or hexafluorosilicic acid (H2SiF6), byproducts of the reaction of fluorapatite (Ca5(PO4)3F) from phosphate rock during the production of superphosphate fertilizer.” i.e. the main source for NAF for water fluoridation is the byproducts of superphosphate fertilizer product.
It’s toxic, because it’s, you know, toxic and waste, because it’s a byproduct of another chemical process - for which (in the US at least) a market has been found.
I’ll defer to your public health expertise, although I will question the wisdom of forcing “treatment” with zero control over dosing on populations.
I’m aware of the link between dental health and heart disease although I am not convinced those are two symptoms of the same causality i.e. wealthier, better educated people take better care of their teeth and their overall health. If there are studies that address these parallel causality, I’ll truly be happy to be better educated on the matter.
I’d simply rather I had the choice to make my own decisions (and yes I realize this is same argument made by anti-vaxxers and I would disagree with them - but my dental health has zero impact on you and your family whereas my spreading of measles or rubella certainly does).
At the end of the day, though, I appreciate your info on the bone fracture stuff. It seems like there are always more studies that contradict previous findings - it’s a real downside to the publish or perish imperative and makes it very hard for the educated layperson to make informed decisions.
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Having been to both cities, I think the median income being the same is misleading as cost of living is much higher in Juneau (as it is in most of Alaska, particularly those areas not reachable by road).
So I think your original point stands - for the same $$ income, people in Portland would be substantially wealthier than people in Juneau.
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The most recent rejected fluoridation plan in Portland was to use floursilicic acid, spending millions to purchase a phosphate fertilizer factory’s waste.
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Since we are talking about dental stuff again, thanks again to whomever suggested a water pick. It has worked swimmingly.
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Probably true that there are no cases of too much fluoride in municipal water, but there is sometimes too much naturally occurring fluoride in water. My Grandma had horrible fluorosis of her teeth, they were brown and caused her constant trouble. I personally prefer the idea of children taking supplements, but I suspect that wouldn’t work in the US. Works great in Germany though, where you get them for free because single payer.
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I wouldn’t be at all complacent about JBS. They are still active in Orange County, and I even saw pamphlets in a Starbucks in La Canada Flintridge! I told the manager about them and they were taken away, but still…
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That’s like people freaking out about how there was something in Subway bread used in yoga mats. So what? That’s guilt by association. Focus on what the thing is and how it is being used and it’s effects on the body. There are many processes that produce “waste” that are essential ingredients for others.
Your background in geochemistry seems to have a blind spot when it comes to the definition of toxic. It’s the dose that makes the poison. Below a certain level, the toxic effects are practically zero if not actually so.
So, you know, NOT toxic anywhere near the amounts relevant here
There is control over the dosage. You are precluded from ingesting a dangerous dose by the fact in order to achieve toxic levels by ingesting fluoridated water you’d die from the water itself first. You can’t lead a completely F- free life even if you live in Juneau or Portland. It exists in nature at non-toxic levels. It’s just a higher, but also non-toxic level when properly added to drinking water.
I’d be willing to bet that fluoridation makes a difference in this country more so than in others based on our poor diet and relatively bad parenting.
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