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Way past time. The link between fluoride ingestion by children and pregnant women to lower IQ in children has been known for years. It's incredible how the sci

Way past time. The link between fluoride ingestion by children and pregnant women to lower IQ in children has been known for years. It's incredible how the scientific community in the US is so ignorant of this fact. Also, dentists have no neuroscience background! So let's take recommendations by dentists to ingest a neurotoxin with deep deep skepticism, shall we?

jcranmer 2y ago
As the saying goes, it's the dose that makes the poison. Vitamin D is also quite toxic, would you celebrate banning that as well?
- kelipso 2y ago
  Yes, there is no need to add vitamin D into the water supply.
  - saagarjha 2y ago
    Yeah, because it’s not water soluble.
jedberg 2y ago
> The link between fluoride ingestion by children and pregnant women to lower IQ in children has been known for years Not at the levels it is found in water in the USA. Those studies were done in countries with much higher levels of fluoride.
- stop50 2y ago
  Or where the people drink much more water
- kelipso 2y ago
  A low dose of this neurotoxin can still have smaller adverse effects on IQ, and in all likelihood do, especially for fetuses and small children. Lots of countries have banned fluoridation of the water supply. The US has one of the highest fluoride levels in the water supply. The default should be to not add neurotoxins into the water supply (I cannot believe I have to actually say this).
  - otterley 2y ago
    If that were true, nearly the entire state of California would have developmental issues. Anyway, lots of things in this world that are bad for people in high doses are beneficial in smaller doses. Water is a great example, as are salt and sugar.
    - kelipso 2y ago
      This logic is so flawed. We. know the biological mechanisms in the body that makes use of salt and sugar. And we know both are safe in relatively large amounts too. With fluoride, relatively small amounts in the drinking water is known to cause lower IQ. But somehow even smaller amounts are safer? Do you just not see the problem here or are you purposely blinding yourself to the reality because of your political biases? Is it an unconscious thing for you? You are simply not being rational. You are making excuses and excuses for holding a belief you have had and probably defended for years. And now you are too invested to left the belief go. Just let it go already.
      - otterley 2y ago
        Badgering people isn't an effective persuasive technique. If you want to convince people that you are right, support your argument with evidence and data. > We know the biological mechanisms in the body that makes use of salt and sugar. We also know it in fluoride: https://www.nidcr.nih.gov/health-info/fluoride/the-story-of-fluoridation https://www.nidcr.nih.gov/health-info/fluoride/the-story-of-... > But somehow even smaller amounts are safer Yes, that's how nature works. Take a look at some typical prescription pharmaceutical doses sometime; many of them are awfully small. Like micrograms per kilogram. The other thing to consider is that in life we balance risks and benefits with the aim of achieving a net positive. Most things that are good have some risks, and many things that are bad have some benefits. We know the benefit of water fluoridation, and the value to society is large. Meanwhile, we suspect there is a possible drawback of water fluoridation, though there is not a lot of data, and the risk is small at the amounts added to municipal water supplies. Nobody has been able to characterize the offsetting loss to any degree of certainty, so we cannot effectively recalculate the cost/benefit analysis.
- jiggawatts 2y ago
  The relationship appears to be linear down to zero, but it’s very hard to study near those levels. From what I’ve seen, the best current science is that the fluoridation levels in typical western countries are reducing average IQ by about 0.5-1.5 points. For reference, adding lead to fuel was far, far worse.
  - robocat 2y ago
    Any citations? I suspect it is hard to control for confounding correlations - specifically I would guess it is more likely that poorer areas are flouridated. HV electric power lines and nuclear stations have the issue that poorer people are more likely to live next to those, and poorer people have have worse health outcomes so it falsely appears that both of those cause the health problems.

jcranmer 2y ago

As the saying goes, it's the dose that makes the poison. Vitamin D is also quite toxic, would you celebrate banning that as well?

kelipso 2y ago
Yes, there is no need to add vitamin D into the water supply.
- saagarjha 2y ago
  Yeah, because it’s not water soluble.

jedberg 2y ago

> The link between fluoride ingestion by children and pregnant women to lower IQ in children has been known for years Not at the levels it is found in water in the USA. Those studies were done in countries with much higher levels of fluoride.

stop50 2y ago
Or where the people drink much more water
kelipso 2y ago
A low dose of this neurotoxin can still have smaller adverse effects on IQ, and in all likelihood do, especially for fetuses and small children. Lots of countries have banned fluoridation of the water supply. The US has one of the highest fluoride levels in the water supply. The default should be to not add neurotoxins into the water supply (I cannot believe I have to actually say this).
- otterley 2y ago
  If that were true, nearly the entire state of California would have developmental issues. Anyway, lots of things in this world that are bad for people in high doses are beneficial in smaller doses. Water is a great example, as are salt and sugar.
  - kelipso 2y ago
    This logic is so flawed. We. know the biological mechanisms in the body that makes use of salt and sugar. And we know both are safe in relatively large amounts too. With fluoride, relatively small amounts in the drinking water is known to cause lower IQ. But somehow even smaller amounts are safer? Do you just not see the problem here or are you purposely blinding yourself to the reality because of your political biases? Is it an unconscious thing for you? You are simply not being rational. You are making excuses and excuses for holding a belief you have had and probably defended for years. And now you are too invested to left the belief go. Just let it go already.
    - otterley 2y ago
      Badgering people isn't an effective persuasive technique. If you want to convince people that you are right, support your argument with evidence and data. > We know the biological mechanisms in the body that makes use of salt and sugar. We also know it in fluoride: https://www.nidcr.nih.gov/health-info/fluoride/the-story-of-fluoridation https://www.nidcr.nih.gov/health-info/fluoride/the-story-of-... > But somehow even smaller amounts are safer Yes, that's how nature works. Take a look at some typical prescription pharmaceutical doses sometime; many of them are awfully small. Like micrograms per kilogram. The other thing to consider is that in life we balance risks and benefits with the aim of achieving a net positive. Most things that are good have some risks, and many things that are bad have some benefits. We know the benefit of water fluoridation, and the value to society is large. Meanwhile, we suspect there is a possible drawback of water fluoridation, though there is not a lot of data, and the risk is small at the amounts added to municipal water supplies. Nobody has been able to characterize the offsetting loss to any degree of certainty, so we cannot effectively recalculate the cost/benefit analysis.
jiggawatts 2y ago
The relationship appears to be linear down to zero, but it’s very hard to study near those levels. From what I’ve seen, the best current science is that the fluoridation levels in typical western countries are reducing average IQ by about 0.5-1.5 points. For reference, adding lead to fuel was far, far worse.
- robocat 2y ago
  Any citations? I suspect it is hard to control for confounding correlations - specifically I would guess it is more likely that poorer areas are flouridated. HV electric power lines and nuclear stations have the issue that poorer people are more likely to live next to those, and poorer people have have worse health outcomes so it falsely appears that both of those cause the health problems.