The Fluoride Action Network Fan Campaign

Bulletin # 38: Connett's testimony in Ireland.

May 17, 2004

Dear All,

I have just returned from Ireland where I gave invited testimony to the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children (of the Irish Parliament) which has been investigating the fluoridation issue. Ireland has been fluoridated since 1963. It is the only country in Europe with a mandatory fluoridation policy. At present approximately 73% of the Irish people are drinking water treated with industrial grade hexafluorosilicic acid imported from Spain.

I gave testimony on Thursday May 13. My testimony was delayed by about 90 minutes as the committee heard from the Department of Health and other government officials on Ireland's support for a new proposal at EU level to allow the sale of genetically modified sweetcorn. This proposal generated considerable consternation among several members of the committee as this is a very hot issue among Irish (and other European) citizens. At this stage there were
approximately 14 or 15 members present. When I eventually gave testimony, the numbers dropped off to about 7 or 8.

I was asked to limit my opening comments to about 10 minutes. These are printed below and as you will see in addition to a printed version of these comments I provided each of the members present with two documents: 1) a copy of the '50 Reasons to Oppose Fluoridation'
which was an updated version of the document I presented to the Fluoridation Forum in October 2000. This can be viewed at http://www.fluoridealert.org/50reasons.htm (click on the printer friendly button to get a pdf file with a short historical introduction) and 2) a critique of the Fluoridation Forum report prepared by eleven scientists including myself (see http://www.fluoridealert.org/irish.forum-critique.htm ).

After my opening presentation I was questioned by a total of 5 people. These included Deputy Olivia Mitchell (health spokesperson for the Fine Gael party); Deputy John Gormley (health spokesperson for the Green Party); Senator Frank Feighan (Fine Gael party); an independent deputy and a senator from the ruling Fianna Fail party. None of the questions were hostile and allowed me plenty of room to elaborate on the concerns presented in the '50 Reasons' and my
disgust with the way the Fluoridation Forum had failed to address these in writing even though they had promised to do so. It has now been three and half years and not a single response has been offered. I pointed out that had the tables been turned I would have had a written answer to '50 Reasons to Promote Fluoridation' in three and half days! I also offered to
return to Ireland at my own expense to participate in a public debate with any promoter of fluoridation if anyone could be found who would agree to do this.

It was interesting that one of the health committee members (Deputy Dermot Fitzpatrick, Fianna Fail party) who was present and known to be pro-fluoridation (he is a dentist) did not pose any questions to me. After the meeting was over he told me that he remained sceptical
of the anti-fluoridation arguments. I gently suggested that he should try to find someone in Ireland who could defend the pro-fluoridation in open public debate.

One of the most exciting parts of the meeting came when a Senator from the ruling party (Fianna Fail) announced that he had once been pro-fluoridation (when he was chair of the Western Ireland Health Board) but had now changed his mind and would campaign against
fluoridation in the future. This seemed to take everyone by surprise.

In the public gallery there were several campaigners against fluoridation present including Dr. Don McAuley who heads the group Irish Dentists Opposed to Fluoridation (IDOF), which now has 47 dentists on board; Dr. Andrew Rhynne who writes a weekly column in the Irish Medical News (his latest piece lampooning Health Minister Michael Martin's pro-fluoridation policy is incredibly funny); Robert Pocock, who is the fluoridation campaigner for the group VOICE for the Irish Environment and Gladys Ryan. Gladys Ryan is the woman who took the Irish government to court in 1963 in an effort to stop the mandatory fluoridation bill going forward. This case went all the way to the supreme court where Gladys lost the ruling. Gladys is now 82. She certainly enjoyed last week's proceedings and we all hope that she will be around when this archaic practice is abandonned in Ireland.

Even though there were reporters present from the Irish times and the Irish Examiner, their coverage went largely to the genetically modified food discussion and not on my presentation. The Irish Times ignored it completely. The Irish Examiner (May 14) added this comment to the end of their coverge of the GM discussion,

The committee was also told by anti-fluoride campaigner, Prof Paul Connett, Professor of Chemistry at St Lawrence University in New York, that key information he gave to a government expert group which looked at the safety of fluoride in water was ignored.'

However, a videotape of the proceedings will be available to the public.

Prior to the hearing, I had a meeting with Enda Kenny, the leader of the Fine Gael party (the major opposition party) who reiterated his personal opposition to water fluoridation.

Paul Connett
_______________________________________________________________
Presentation to the Joint Committee on Health and Children
May 13, 2004
By
Dr. Paul Connett,
Professor of Chemistry,
St. Lawrence University,
Canton, NY 13617, USA
315-379-9200
ggvideo@northnet.org
http://www.fluoridealert.org

Mr Chairman and Committee Members, thank you for this invitation to address you on the issue of water fluoridation and the report of the Fluoridation Forum.

You should have received three documents from me:

1) A recently updated and published version of the '50 Reasons to Oppose Fluoridation.'

2) A copy of the scientific critique of the Fluoridation Forum Report, prepared by myself and 10 other scientists and circulated by the group VOICE.

3) A printed copy of these opening remarks.

As I believe you know I was invited to present my scientific concerns to the Fluoridation Forum in October 2000. As there was considerable concern from Irish citizens on the objectivity of the panel I decided I would challenge the members to answer the '50 Reasons to Oppose Fluoridation.' The panel agreed that they would answer these questions and set up a sub-committee to do so. However, after 18 months they announced that they didn't have time to complete this task, but stated that reasons would be addressed in the body of their report. They were not.

When the report finally appeared it presented a totally inadequate analysis of the health concerns as they have been reported in the literature. Out of 296 pages in their report they only devoted 17 pages to health effects other than dental fluorosis (pp 108-124). 16 of these pages simply summarized other reviews. For the single issue (increased hip fractures in the elderly) for which they examined the original literature they spent less than one page summarizing only three papers (pp122,123).

In addition to their failure to answer the '50 Reasons' as promised, I was particularly disappointed to discover that they didn't review two of the key studies for which I presented information in October 2000. These were the papers on the accumulation of fluoride in the human pineal gland by Jennifer Luke and a study by Li et al. who examined hip fracture rates in China. Both of these studies had been published by the time the Fluoridation Forum was published.

I am bewildered that the Ministry of Health and Children would go to the expense of flying me over from the US to give testimony to this panel, only to have them ignore the key information I presented.

I think it is regrettable that they ignored both of these studies. Jennifer Luke's study on fluoride and the pineal gland is particularly important. She found that fluoride accumulates in the human pineal gland to very high levels and also found in animal studies that fluoride lowered the production of the important hormone melatonin as well as shortening the time that it took for these animals as to reach puberty.

It is also regrettable that they ignored the study by Li et al. (2001) because it contradicts their conclusion that 'long term exposure to fluoride does not have an adverse effect on bone strength, bone mineral density or fracture incidence'. In fact, Li et al. found a dose related
increase in hip fracture in the elderly in six Chinese villages. In this study the hip fracture rates in the village at 1.5 ppm was double the rate of the village at 1ppm, and the village above 4.3 ppm had triple rate of hip fracture. For such a serious outcome this result indicates a very small margin of safety, especially when considering that once fluoride is deliberately added to the water one cannot control the dose people receive from the water and from other sources.

In these short opening remarks I cannot possibly address all '50 Reasons to Oppose Fluoridation.' However, I will be happy to elaborate on any that interest committee members, as well as any of the arguments we have made in our scientific critique of the Fluoridation Forum report.

Here I would like to stress 6 concerns:

1) Fluoride is present in mothers' milk at very low levels, i.e. 0.005 - 0.01 ppm. This means that fluoride is unlikely to be an essential nutrient. It also means that women who bottle feed their babies in Ireland will be giving them up to 200 times the level that nature intended to be in their first meals (See reasons 1,11).

2) Point 1) becomes of critical concern when we note the numerous studies which indicate fluoride can damage animal brain and the recent studies from China (Xiang et al, 2003 a. and b.) which indicate a lowering of IQ associated with fluoride levels of 1.8 ppm. This again suggests a ridiculously low margin of safety for another serious outcome (See Reasons
19, 20).

3) Also of concern with respect to children's IQ are the studies by Masters and Coplan (1999, 2000) who have found an association between the fluoridating agent used in Ireland and the uptake of environmental lead into children's blood (See Reasons 42, 43, 44).

4) Still on the brain is the Varner et al.(1998) study which found that rats dosed with fluoride at 1 ppm in their drinking water for 1 year resulted in a greater uptake of aluminium into their brains and the formation of beta amyloid deposits which are characteristic lesions observed in Alzheimer's patients (See Reasons 17, 18).

5) There are about 800 studies in the biochemical literature which indicate that fluoride in the presence of aluminium switches on G-proteins which are involved in the transmission of hormonal and other messages across cellular membranes. Thus fluoride has the potential to scramble important regulatory signals in the brain and other tissues. Points 4) and 5) are particularly alarming when one notes the recent reports that several counties in Ireland frequently exceed the safe levels of aluminium in their water, sometimes by margins as high as 500%. Exceeding the aluminium levels is bad enough, but when they are exceeded in the presence of fluoride ions it could be considerably worse (See Reason 14).

6) There are many other health concerns, but I will end my opening remarks by noting that fluoride's proven benefits to teeth are very slight ( in the largest government sponsored survey a difference of only 0.6 tooth surfaces out of 128 tooth surfaces in a child's mouth was found, and this difference was not shown to be statistically significant, Brunelle and Carlos, 1990)
and as recently as 1999, the CDC conceded that these benefits are TOPICAL not SYSTEMIC (See Reasons 2-7).

Conclusion: For such slight benefits how could any rational person advocate a practice which poses such risks? And confronted with such a problematic risk versus benefit equation how could any government force such a practice on individuals without their informed consent. This takes governmental arrogance to a whole new level. For those who do not wish to be exposed to fluoride this practice denies them a crucial human right. For those who do wish to receive fluoride, halting fluoridation will deprive them of nothing, since fluoride is universally and readily available in fluoridated toothpaste.

I hope I have presented enough in this opening statement and supporting documents to encourage this subcommittee to call for an immediate halt to this outdated, discredited and non-defendable practice.

Thank you.