The same group of fluoride salesmen that unsuccessfully fought a 1999 vote of Santa Cruz citizens to establish an ordinance that prohibits the addition of any substance to the public water supply that is intended to treat humans rather than the water are back in Santa Cruz, and heading for Watsonville, and maybe other communities in the region.

This same group that could not answer the question of how much fluoride individuals in the community are already receiving are armed with a pocketful of money and the same fifty-year old rhetoric that poor children are not swallowing enough fluoride that would otherwise eliminate tooth decay, completely ignoring that fluoride is already present in higher concentrations than fluoridated water in sodas, fruit juices, cereals, teas, and, because of fluoride-based pesticide residues, on such produce as tomatoes, lettuce, potatoes, cabbage, and raisins. In 1991, government documents reported that non-fluoridated communities already receive the supposed goal of 1 milligram of fluoride a day, with fluoridated communities receiving 3 to 7 milligrams a day – far exceeding the margin of safety.

What they won’t be revealing to their targeted legislators and City Council Members or even their unsuspecting well-intended supporters follows:

*       The July 2000 peer-reviewed cover story of the Journal of the American Dental Association (JADA) just reminded every dentist in America that ingestion of fluoride does not provide any significant reduction in the incidence of tooth decay – that any beneficial dental effect is as a result of topical application directly to the tooth;

* The American Dental Association and American Academy of Pediatrics have revised their recommendations for controlled-dose fluoride which restricts a doctor from prescribing fluoride to a child of 6 months to 3 years of age to the amount found in one cup of fluoridated (at 1 ppm) water – none to an infant (meaning that as a public policy fluoridation mass medicates at a higher expected dosage than a doctor in a non-fluoridated community can prescribe);

*        There is an ongoing Congressional investigation by the House Committee on Science in which the Environmental Protection Agency, Center for Disease Control, National Sanitation Foundation, and the Food and Drug Administration (from other documents), have all replied that they have no scientific studies on the actual fluorine-bearing substances used in 90% of the nation’s fluoridation programs;

*    On June 29, 2000, at the U.S. Senate Congressional Hearing on Arsenic, Radon, and Fluoride, held by the subcommittee on Fisheries, Wildlife, and Water, J. William Hirzy, Ph.D. testified, on behalf of the union (that consists of and represents all of the toxicologists, biologists, chemists, physicians, statisticians, epidemiologists, attorneys, engineers, scientists, and other professionals at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Washington, D.C.), calling for a moratorium on all fluoridation. This was based on scientific evidence they have in their possession and court findings in three different states, whose conclusions have never been overturned on the merits, that found with reasonable certainty (i.e. beyond speculation and guess) and by preponderance of the evidence, including the testimony of experts learned in the field, that fluoride in public water supplies causes or contributes to the cause of cancer, genetic damage, intolerant reactions, chronic toxicity, dental fluorosis, bone pathology and neurological injury in humans, and that fluoride in public water supplies aggravates malnutrition, iodine deficiencies, and other existing illnesses.

*       On October 26, 2000, Assemblyman Kelly (NJ-R) petitioned the FDA to remove all controlled-dose fluoride supplements (drops, tablets, and vitamins) from the market, based on scientific proof that claims that ingestion of fluoride reduces tooth decay are fraudulent, that ingestion of fluoride is harmful to health, and that the FDA has never approved for safety and effectiveness any fluorine-bearing product intended to be ingested for the purpose of reducing tooth decay.

*       98% of Europe is now fluoridation free. The two holdouts are represented by England, 10% fluoridated, and Ireland, 73% fluoridated. The second largest political party of the most fluoridated population in the world, Ireland’s Fine Gael, reported the week of January 15, 2001 that they have established as a major platform the eradication of all artificial fluoridation in the country due to “serious health concerns”; even directing that the amount of natural fluoride in the water be reevaluated.

Testimony in the Senate Hearing, questions from the committee on Science and responses from protective agencies, the full 13 page JADA cover story, and the petition from Kelly to the FDA, and future responses and activities can be accessed at: http://www.citizens.org

Once, again citizens will have to rally to protect themselves against the political pressures of a group that has decided that their version of public policy and health must be complied with by every member of the community for the rest of our lives.

You must act now if you do not want to be forced into drinking and bathing in industry’s toxic waste for the rest of your lives.
Call in Santa Cruz: (831) 458-1734. Call in Watsonville: (800) 728-3833.