Last updated 08:29, Friday, 19 September 2008

DIANNE Standen, of Cumbrians Against Fluoridation, says: “For over 30 years people in West Cumbria have had fluoride in their water.

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No effort has been made by health and water authorities to test the levels or explore the the impact of fluoride in people’s bodies.

They have experimented on the community without consent and there are questions the health authority needs to honestly answer.

Why has the advice from the American Dental Association to avoid using fluoridated water to mix powdered milk for babies not been circulated to local parents?

Why do health authorities describe dental fluorosis [the surface damage common in children reared in fluoridated areas] as ‘cosmetic’ when it indicates exposure to an excessive amount of fluoride which may damage bones and health?

Why do they not publicise the information printed on American fluoride toothpaste that young children brushing with fluoridated toothpaste

must be supervised and any quantity swallowed larger than a pea should be treated as poisonous?

Why do the health authorities refer to fluoridation of the water as adjustment of natural fluoride levels when the material they use is not natural but hexafluorosilic acid?

Why do they not inform the public that this material, produced as a by-product of the fertiliser industry, contains small amounts of phosphorous pentoxide, iron, cadmium, nickel, aluminium, copper, lead, chromium, arsenic, antimony, vanadium, berylium and mercury?

Why have they failed to tell people that around 50 per cent of a person’s daily fluoride intake accumulates in the bones and at high levels can cause skeletal fluorosis?

Why do they not inform people that using fluoride toothpaste, drinking tea, eating fish, washing and consuming local food in fluoridated areas will greatly increase their daily intake?

Why do they not report that the scientists who led the only extensive scientific review of fluoridation accused the Department of Health of using their findings “selectively . . . to give an over-optimistic assessment of the evidence in favour of fluoridation"?

Why have they ignored the advice from scientists that quality research should be undertaken into fluoridation to determine its safety and effectiveness?

Why do they insist on adding fluoride to water when research advises that fluoride is best applied to the teeth through toothpaste?

Why do they insist on this inefficient, autocratic approach to improving teeth when it’s been proved internationally that dental health improves with good dental care and an improved diet?”