FLUORIDE DATE LECTURE #49 - WIC: BILINGUAL DECEPTION
Good afternoon, Council members. Last December 15, when you voted to continue the indefensible practice of water fluoridation, you awarded to the victims of that practice a sort of consolation prize: the promise of flyers with information in English and Spanish about dental fluorosis to be posted at WIC centers around town. (WIC stands for Women, Infants & Children - a state-run nourishment program for low-income mothers.) The flyers—which I’ve distributed as a handout—are quite attractive, with bright kid colors and an appealing layout. Unfortunately, they’re also grossly misleading.
The very first sentence is just plain wrong: so-called optimally-fluoridated water poses many health risks for infants, of which you’re all aware. The last paragraph contains an egregious contradiction. After telling mothers how to to minimize an infant’s exposure to fluoride, it then adds that if they do so, “Your baby’s doctor may recommend fluoride supplements beginning at age six months.”
The upshot is to plant doubt in the parent’s mind and to promote the spurious notion of a nutritional requirement for fluoride, theoretically beginning on baby’s six-month birthday. Why six months?—when milk or formula is a baby’s primary sustenance for the first full year, and both the CDC’s and ADA’s 2006 cautions against mixing formula with tap water plainly referenced the first 12 months of life?
Best guess: infants cut their first tooth, on average, at around six months. Even the fluoride pushers, in their frenzy to sell their product, recognize the absurdity of trying to peddle a supposed cavity fighter for toothless beings. But the moment that first tooth erupts: voila! A new customer is born.
The CDC/ADA’s warnings, however, pertain to dental fluorosis, and babies over six months of age are no less susceptible to that condition than those under six months. Fluorosis develops in teeth as they form beneath the gums—and the 6-to-12-month-old is still living largely on liquids. So why should a doctor want to prescribe any fluoride at all?
The wording has been made deliberately vague. The doctor “may” recommend supplements beginning at 6 months. Then again, they may not. Either way, such a recommendation, would be inappropriate.
We’ve tracked the language of this strange final sentence to the document from which it was cribbed word for word: a February 2010 newsletter written by one Jay Hoecker, MD of the Mayo Clinic. Ironically, Mayo, once a supporter of water fluoridation, has withdrawn its endorsement.
Posted by M. Rae Nadler-Olenick at 2/3/2012 12:35 AM 
Categories: health wellness environment politics
Tags: WIC babies formula tap water fluoride infant formula babies
Categories: health wellness environment politics
Tags: WIC babies formula tap water fluoride infant formula babies
Review of Fluoride Supplement Studies Show No Evidence of Safety - No Benefit Either
According to the Cochrane Oral Health Group, fluoride supplements fail to reduce tooth decay in primary teeth, permanent teeth cavity-reduction is dubious and health risks are little studied -- The Pennsylvania Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends NO fluoride supplementation because "Too much fluoride causes streaks in the teeth" and it's impossible to determine a child's individual daily fluoride intake from all sources.
Sodium fluoride supplements "have not been found by FDA to be safe or effective," according to the U.S. National Library of Medicine.
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