Manatee, Hillsborough and Polk Counties suffer four times the fluoride air pollution burdens which apparently have caused acute fluorosis of cattle in Maryland as reported by the Washington Post in an article published Saturday in the Herald-Tribune.

The impacts of the Florida pollution, however, have been carefully concealed by the phosphate companies from whose mills the pollutants belch.

The cattle grazing the pastures polluted by the poisonous chemical are owned either by the phosphate companies or by cattlemen leasing the land from the companies.

According to several sources contacted by the Herald-Tribune, complaint of pollution by a cattleman is sufficient cause for termination of his lease.

As a result, diseased cattle rarely surface at the state’s veterinary diagnostic clinic, are treated privately if at all and are seldom mentioned as clinical examples in recent professional literature on the medically unique disease.

In Maryland, affected dairy cattle within two miles of an aluminum smelter emitting fluorides have exhibited intermittent fever, coughing fits, lameness, hoof malformations and in one extreme case, death by debilitation and starvation.

More recently, nearby farm families have complained of dizziness, nausea, fatigue, arthritic pains and aching muscles and eye and throat irritations.

A Michigan allergist found evidence of five cases of fluoride toxicity in 10 Maryland residents he examined.

The problem, obviously, is not of such intensity in Polk County, however, where mention of the issue is invariably prefaced with requests that the source be held in confidence because of feared repercussions from the phosphate industry.

(NOTE: This article, which starts on page 1 of the newspaper, continues onto page 5A. Unfortunately, the Fluoride Action Network only has the part of the article that appeared on page 1 (above), and not on 5A.)

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