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Health officials delayed report linking fluoride to brain harm

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331–340 of 468 posts

Re: Health officials delayed report linking fluoride to brain harm

#331

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well it halved childhood cavities in the 50s. It did its job and I don’t think it’s hard to understand why it was done. Same reason why they stared iodine to salt… because people were having mental development issues. Now is it still necessary? That’s a different question but let’s not pretend that we don’t know why it was done.

> Now is it still necessary? An experiment in Windsor, Ontario (across the border from Detroit, MI): > Yemmi Calito's children are patients of Dr. Meriano. The two oldest kids were raised on fluoridated water in Windsor and both have healthy teeth. Her two youngest weren't, and they've had to be treated for serious tooth decay. Calito said their oral hygiene habits are the same. > "The younger two I feel they have mo…

Hot take: why don’t we stop the root cause of the problem, instead of the insestuous habit of layering on symptom management on top of symptom management.

Stop giving kids these insanely high levels of sugar. No soda is a great start.

Same thorn in my side is this completely crazy trend that this new life-long injection Ozempic/Wegovy is being suggested for kids 12 and up. Like what? It also atrophies muscle, tendons, and bones.

I hope with the next generation of leaders, we stop this madness of blindly trusting big pharma and corporations and ask where the money trail goes, and what may actually be best for our kids and loved ones.

Re: Health officials delayed report linking fluoride to brain harm

#332

Earlier quoted context omitted.

adrian_b vs. health scientists throughout the world and history, ca. 1:1e10 Who to believe here, who should we believe here, hm, very difficult problem, adrian_b's passionate statements or practically all the professionals of the world. I go and contemplate over this for a while now. : )

1e10 people is about 10% of everyone who has ever lived. It's more than the current global population.

One can score multiple times! : )

Re: Health officials delayed report linking fluoride to brain harm

#333
post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Omg, no wonder my teeth are getting worse after moving to Amsterdam. I drink a ton of water and use Maldon salt. I didn’t realize there wasn’t fluoride in the water. (All the Nutella isn’t helping either, but… ooh, maybe that’s a reasonable vector for Europeans)

Everyone in the Netherlands is using fluorided toothpaste and brushes twice a day, cavities are really low.

> Everyone

Defined as a completely made up percentage of people that is in fact < 100%.

Re: Health officials delayed report linking fluoride to brain harm

#334
post #292
post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have a reference for that? I'm from Sweden and I can definitely say preventive dental care is a huge thing here. I felt your statement sounded weird so I googled around. DMFT seems to be one index used to rank countries oral health, which is produced by WHO. In that ranking several European countries beat or sit at US levels. Do you only mean eastern Europe? This links to OECDs compilation of WHOs data, was ea…

That study is for children. Oral health problems take years to surface and looking at adults would be a better way to measure these things. Having lived in both the US and France, I can say that it’s been my experience that Americans have “nicer” looking teeth. Whether that translates into anything medically relevant is apparently really difficult to prove.

Could it be difference in diet and or smoking?

Re: Health officials delayed report linking fluoride to brain harm

#335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some people lack the self control to use toothpaste regularly. For those people it's beneficial adding flouride to water.

> Some people lack the self control to use toothpaste regularly. For those people it's beneficial adding flouride to water. At some point, we can't just replace individual personal responsibility with the State as a solution. This attitude just reeks of infantilization of the total populace just because a certain percentage of them lack such self control. If you still want to provide support to them, make it targeted…

I don't think I was expressing much of an attitude in my comment. Just a factual statement that seeks to explain why the intervention is successful even though better alternatives clearly exist.

I don't think water should be flouridated and I don't think we should provide support for people lacking self control.

Re: Health officials delayed report linking fluoride to brain harm

#336
post #324

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It really isn't. Lower cognition is strongly associated with dissatisfaction and violence, not to mention much lower economic productivity (less taxes!).

Who cares about taxes when you can print money?

Money has value because of what it buys.

If a society is making 400 widgets it doesn't matter whether each is priced at $2 or $999, the government will only be able to get 400 widgets.

A stupider population makes much less widgets.

Re: Health officials delayed report linking fluoride to brain harm

#337
post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The harmful dose is many orders of magnitude higher than the concentration in tap water. Dose makes the poison. Literally any chemical in sufficient dose is poisonous

Tooth decay is caused by acid produced by bacteria. It's too bad we can't displace the bacteria themselves instead of working downstream from that.

Is there a reason we don't just rinse with a base?

Re: Health officials delayed report linking fluoride to brain harm

#338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Now is it still necessary? An experiment in Windsor, Ontario (across the border from Detroit, MI): > Yemmi Calito's children are patients of Dr. Meriano. The two oldest kids were raised on fluoridated water in Windsor and both have healthy teeth. Her two youngest weren't, and they've had to be treated for serious tooth decay. Calito said their oral hygiene habits are the same. > "The younger two I feel they have mo…

Hot take: why don’t we stop the root cause of the problem, instead of the insestuous habit of layering on symptom management on top of symptom management. Stop giving kids these insanely high levels of sugar. No soda is a great start. Same thorn in my side is this completely crazy trend that this new life-long injection Ozempic/Wegovy is being suggested for kids 12 and up. Like what? It also atrophies muscle, tendons…

It’s probably worth noting that genetics is probably a significantly big factor than affects cavities, similar to lots of other stuff. Some folks can eat sugar foods and not brush twice a day and have no issues, while others who even floss daily end up with bad teeth.

Not saying you shouldn’t reduce sugar intake, that’s not my point - but - factors like genetics are very important too, and fluoride might help for such people.

Re: Health officials delayed report linking fluoride to brain harm

#339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Now is it still necessary? An experiment in Windsor, Ontario (across the border from Detroit, MI): > Yemmi Calito's children are patients of Dr. Meriano. The two oldest kids were raised on fluoridated water in Windsor and both have healthy teeth. Her two youngest weren't, and they've had to be treated for serious tooth decay. Calito said their oral hygiene habits are the same. > "The younger two I feel they have mo…

Hot take: why don’t we stop the root cause of the problem, instead of the insestuous habit of layering on symptom management on top of symptom management. Stop giving kids these insanely high levels of sugar. No soda is a great start. Same thorn in my side is this completely crazy trend that this new life-long injection Ozempic/Wegovy is being suggested for kids 12 and up. Like what? It also atrophies muscle, tendons…

People love treating symptoms because humans are notoriously shortsighted

Re: Health officials delayed report linking fluoride to brain harm

#340
It's fascinating. Having gone through 301 comments and there really hasn't been any deep discussion at whether or not fluoride has been linked to brain harm.... There are little debates about drinking water. I'm disappointed..I'm gonna to have to do some digging.
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