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Fluoride panel recommendation old news for Pointe Claire

by Raffy Boudjikanian
View all articles from Raffy Boudjikanian
Article online since August 6th 2008, 7:00
Read all 2 comments about this article / Comment on this article

Raffy Boudjikanian

raffy.boudjikanian@transcontinental.ca

While Health Canada is implementing the recommendation of an independent expert panel to reduce the amount of fluoride it urges municipalities to put in drinkable water to 0.7 parts per million, the City of Pointe Claire is already ahead of the pack.

"We've been doing that for years," Mayor Bill McMurchie told The Chronicle. He said the city reduced its fluoride amount to the 0.7 at least three years ago.

The fluoride debate has been raging across Canada for years. Dentists recommend its injection into drinking water as a means to prevent tooth decay and cavities. However, environmentalists say it's bad for the environment and too much of it may cause fluorosis, or mottled teeth, as well as bone cancer.

"We have to be more careful about how (these chemicals) are added," said Daniel Green of Sierra Club, an environmental group. He lauded the panel's recommendation for caution, stating anything that is useful or healthy in small doses can turn out to be dangerous when not consumed in moderation.

Though Green was not opposed to the recommendation, he said a serious look is needed at how much fluoride is already in water before more is added, particularly in the province of Quebec.

"There is a lot of fluoride (in Quebec waters) because of the aluminium industry," said Green. The cumulative effect of all this dumping is unknown, he said, but he pointed to factories in Baie-Comeau and Shawinigan. "There are so many aluminium plants in the St. Lawrence River and the St. Lawrence River basin," he added.

Green said studies should be undertaken to determine how much fluoride there already is in the water before anymore is added in Quebec.

Quebec has one of the lowest fluoridation rates of any province in the country, with only eight per cent of the population here receiving fluoride in their drinkable water, according to a 2004 study by the Environment Ministry.

The provincial government encourages fluoride use in water. The 2004 study hopes 50 per cent of Quebecers will have access to fluoridated water by 2012, but sets no particular target as to how much fluoride should be in water.

Montreal does not fluoridate its water, citing the health risks mentioned above, though it became a major issue during the previous municipal elections, with Pierre Bourque, opposition leader at the time, vowing to return fluoride if he were elected.

On the West Island, the City of Dorval also fluoridated its water up to the end of 2003, when it stopped due to an equipment malfunction. After a nearly four-year break, the city was planning to start fluoridating its water again by the end of July, although dosage remains unclear. "The equipment will be ready within the next week or so," Dorval Mayor Edgar Rouleau had told The Chronicle two weeks ago. However, no city officials returned phone calls for comment as of press time.

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Your comments

Heather Solomon

Comment online since August 6th 2008
I think it might be a good idea for the coucil to read the article posted on the Montreal Children's Hospital website written by Health Canada, about the negative effects of floride on children, poerhaps they would be less likely to put it in the drinking water.
http://www.thechildren.com/en/news/focus.aspx?id=415

nyscof

Comment online since August 6th 2008
Professionals Urge Fluoridation End

Over 1,780 professionals signed a statement urging Congress to stop water fluoridation until Congressional hearings are conducted. They cite new scientific evidence that fluoridation, long promoted to fight tooth decay, is ineffective and has serious health risks. See statement: http://www.fluorideaction.org/statement.august.2007.html

Fluoridation is the addition of fluoride chemicals (usually phosphate fertilizer industry's impure waste, silicofluorides) into drinking water ostensibly to prevent cavities in tap water drinkers..

Signers include a Nobel Prize winner, three members of the prestigious 2006 National Research Council (NRC) panel that reported on fluoride’s toxicology, three officers in the Union representing professionals at EPA headquarters, the President of the International Society of Doctors for the Environment, and hundreds of medical, dental, academic, scientific and environmental professionals, worldwide.

Signer Dr. Arvid Carlsson, winner of the 2000 Nobel Prize for Medicine, says, “Fluoridation is against all principles of modern pharmacology. It's really obsolete.”

An Online Action Petition to Congress in support of the Professionals' Statement is available on FAN's web site, http://congress.fluorideaction.net and over 13,800 individuals have signed so far.

“The NRC report dramatically changed scientific understanding of fluoride's health risks," says Paul Connett, PhD, Executive Director, Fluoride Action Network. "Government officials who continue to promote fluoridation must testify under oath as to why they are ignoring the powerful evidence of harm in the NRC report,” he added.

As a result of the NRC report, the National Kidney Foundation has dropped its support of fluoridation citing evidence that fluoride harms all those with chronic kidney disease, not just those on dialysis. (2)

The Professionals’ Statement also references:

-- The new American Dental Association policy recommending infant formula NOT be prepared with fluoridated water.

-- The CDC’s concession that the predominant benefit of fluoride is topical not systemic.

-- CDC data showing that dental fluorosis, caused by fluoride over-exposure, now impacts one third of American children.

-- Major research indicating little difference in decay rates between fluoridated and non-fluoridated communities.

-- A Harvard study indicating a possible link between fluoridation and bone cancer.

The Environmental Working Group (EWG), a DC watchdog, revealed that a Harvard professor concealed the fluoridation/bone cancer connection for three years. EWG President Ken Cook states, “It is time for the US to recognize that fluoridation has serious risks that far outweigh any minor benefits, and unlike many other environmental issues, it's as easy to end as turning off a valve at the water plant.”

Further, researchers reporting in the Oct 6 2007 British Medical Journal indicate that fluoridation, touted as a safe cavity preventive, never was proven safe or effective and may be unethical. (1)

END

References:

(1) “Adding fluoride to water supplies,” British Medical Journal, KK Cheng, Iain Chalmers, Trevor A. Sheldon, October 6, 2007

2) National Kidney Foundation, “Fluoride Intake in Chronic Kidney Disease,”

April 15, 2008

http://www.kidney.org/atoz/pdf/Fluoride_Intake_

n_CKD.pdf

For more info
http://www.FluorideAction.Net