That drug is fluoride, a chemical that not only damages tooth enamel, but is a known endocrine disruptor that interferes with thyroid function and interferes with brain function. Studies show that nearly 65% of U.S. children ages 12 to 15 have fluorosis in varying degrees to their tooth enamel, from white stains and mottling to permanent brown stains and pitting.
What’s worse, a Harvard report has shown that children ingesting higher levels of fluoride tested an average seven IQ points lower in 26 of 27 studies. Yet, municipalities across the U.S. insist on adding fluoride to their water.
What’s abhorrent, though, is that the American Dental Association and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention maintain that consumption of fluoridated water is safe, reduces dental caries in children and adults, and therefore has significant public health benefits.
But how can that be? Why would the very entities charged with caring for your body and your teeth endorse something that disrupts your brain and damages your teeth — especially when the U.S. Food and Drug Administration warns you that if you or child accidentally swallows fluoridated toothpaste that you get medical help or contact a poison control center right away?
It’s especially incongruous when you consider that the CDC warns mothers not to mix baby formula with fluoridated water.
Yet, when fluoride is added to drinking water, the FDA looks the other way, even though unlike other drugs, fluoride has never undergone clinical trials to establish its safety and effectiveness. The bottom line is fluoride is a black hole without any regulation — a poison on tap that most people drink without even thinking about whether it’s safe.
With other drugs, physicians prescribe a dose based on an individual’s needs for a specific length of time — but not with fluoride. Why? Several European countries, including France, Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands and Czech Republic, all question refuse to add fluoride to their water, citing ethical problems with putting a drug in drinking water to be consumed in unknown amounts and doses dependent on how much water you drink.
Concerned that all these questions remain unanswered, Steve Gilbert, founder and director of the Institute of Neurotoxicology and Neurological Disorders (INND) and a diplomat of the American Board of Toxicology, has put together a formal, four-page statement asking that communities and governments rethink their fluoridation policies and connect the dots — and help improve the health of children and adults by ending fluoridation of U.S. drinking water.
To that end, In November 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 individual mothers, filed a petition calling on the EPA to ban the deliberate addition of fluoridating chemicals to the drinking water under provisions in the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA).
The petition included more than 2,500 pages of scientific documentation detailing the risks of water fluoridation. A trial date has been set for August 2019. Please, do your part by following the case, donating to the cause if you can and working in your own communities to end the drugging of anyone who wants a simple glass of water.