Fluoridation

Thank you for covering this important issue. I believe the issue of water fluoridation to be more important than the stadium debate and the election put together.

The reason is simple; fluoride affects me, you and everybody else in our community, whether we know it or not and whether we accept it or not. There are several statements in the editorial "Mass Medication" which I find surprising but none more so than the “recommendation” that our councillors should trust and believe in this “essential public health measure” as supported by our Ministry of Health.
I do agree that we should be able to trust the government on the issue of public health, but can we?

The answer is an emphatic no, a non-emotional and factually verifiable no.

1. The Ministry of Health has been wrong before. 

2. The Ministry of Health show little interest in wanting to learn or update their knowledge and they didn't even attend the recent Society for Fluoride Research meeting in Toronto where the toxicity of fluoride was discussed.

3. In council meetings and public meetings we get to hear from Dr Dorothy Boyd about how fluoride is supposed to be good for our teeth, but we don't get to hear about what it does to the rest of the body. The fluoride used in our water is not naturally occurring and there is nothing essential about it. It is a dangerous neurotoxin and it is an industrial byproduct from fertiliser plants in Belgium. To think that the only effect it has on the human body is on the teeth is illogical and even naïve. Not what you would expect from a government who is supposed to have our best interest at heart.

4. The Ministry of Health and public officials marketing their policy never addresses the very important question on why 97% of Europe has banned, stopped or rejected fluoride. If fluoridation was essential, why do most of these countries have the same or superior dental health? http://www.fluoridealert.org/govt-statements.htm

5. The World Health Organisation publish data which show that non-fluoridated European countries have experienced the same decline in dental caries as New Zealand, or even better (in 2005 Sweden had 70% less DMFT’s than NZ). The Ministry of Health only seems to look at the recommendation and then they ignore the facts. http://www.fluoridealert.org/health/teeth/caries/who-dmft.html

6. It might be wise to ask yourself; if water fluoridation is as good as the government says; why do they lack the political will to enforce a national, compulsory program of water fluoridation?

7. The Nobel Prize is the most highly regarded academic award on our planet. A lifetime of work is celebrated by peers, royalty and worldwide media. No fewer than 14 recipients of this prize have spoken out against fluoridation. Among them is Dr Arvid Carlsson (Medicine 2000) who says that nations that still practice fluoridation “should feel ashamed of themselves”.

The claims that anyone in our Ministry of Health has knowledge and experience equal to, or even remotely similar to that of Dr Arvid Carlsson seem rather farfetched. Cr Michael Guest may believe he is a “snake-oil salesman and a quack” but I don’t.

8. The government is also charged with protecting our individual rights, yours and mine. The NZ Bill of Rights (1990) clearly state that we “have the right to refuse medication”.
Having educated myself on this issue I refuse to be forcibly fluoridated by our councillors. They have no medical training and if my own Doctor is unable to force medicate me, why should I permit politicians to do it?

The debate on the pros and cons of fluoridation rages in those English speaking countries that still fluoridate. The rest of the world seems to look on with a bemused silence wondering what on earth is so difficult to understand. It is time to let your councillors know what you think.

Jonas Hjertquist,

Maryhill, Dunedin