USA - Fluoridegate: Fluoride Spots On Teeth The Tip Of The Iceberg

Fluoridegate: Fluoride Spots On Teeth The Tip Of The Iceberg
Decades of assurances that consuming fluoride in drinking water is a safe and an effective way to prevent cavities are being called into question as a jarring Fluoridegate controversy erupts across the nation.

A series of disclosures are surfacing about the actions of water fluoridation promoters that point to a likely tsunami of Fluoridegate investigations, hearings, and explosive courtroom entanglements.

Tennessee state legislator Frank Niceley states, "There is a real Fluoridegate scandal here. Citizens haven't been told about harm from fluorides, and this needs to be investigated by the authorities and the media."

Washington D.C. toxic tort attorney Chris Nidel says, "I think when we look back we'll ask why Fluoridegate didn't surface earlier. There are serious concerns about possible conflict of interest and heavy editing of information being fed to the public about fluoride risks and impacts."

On January 7, 2011 officials at the U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services recommended lowering the amount of fluoride in drinking water.

Health officials stated that their recommendation was simply a fine-tuning of fluoride levels to prevent a largely unnoticeable teeth staining called "dental fluorosis." But information now being shown to law firms, legislators, and investigative journalists affirms that the tooth staining is often disfiguring, that fluorides pose multiple other risks, and that questions about conflict of interest, undue influence and improper actions warrant investigation.

Americans are surprised to learn that the Centers for Disease Control's Oral Health Division is in charge of making assessments and statements for CDC about outside-the-mouth fluoride safety and research.

The apparent conflict of interest is drawing fire from several angles.

"This is clearly the fox guarding the henhouse," states Daniel G. Stockin about the CDC. Stockin is a career public health professional and former manager of the EPA Western Regional Lead Training Center. He works at The Lillie Center, a small firm in Georgia known for its efforts toward ending fluoridation.

"A number of groups, law firms, and journalists now want the names and job descriptions of persons inside CDC, both now and previously, that have been responsible for CDC's promotion of water fluoridation," Stockin says.

Other key issues are surfacing: Was improper influence by dental groups the reason CDC did not issue a press release four years ago about risks related to baby formula and fluoride? At the time, CDC quietly admitted on a little-noticed web page that because of possible dental fluorosis, parents may want to mix infant milk formula with unfluoridated water.

The Gerber baby products company now sells an unfluoridated water so parents of babies can avoid using fluoridated water for mixing milk formula.

Additional explosive questions offer to ignite investigative hearings: Why did CDC not openly share with the black community CDC's own data showing black Americans to be disproportionately harmed by the worst forms of dental fluorosis? Who is to pay for expensive teeth repair for persons unwilling to live with disfiguring dental fluorosis?