Friday, April 10, 2015

ANOTHER FLUORIDE FATALITY: A PHYSICIAN’S DILEMMA

ANOTHER FLUORIDE FATALITY: 
A PHYSICIAN’S DILEMMA
FLUORIDE
April 1979; Volume 12; Pages 55-57

EDITORIAL: ANOTHER FLUORIDE FATALITY: A PHYSICIAN’S DILEMMA

In the October 1978 issue of Fluoride (1) two fatalities due to acute fluoride poisoning were reported which resulted from a widely held, but mistaken, opinion of physicians and dentists concerning the toxicity of fluoride. Relying on outdated textbook data, the physicians involved in these cases underestimated the magnitude of fluoride’s toxic action.

In response to the editorial, the editor received a communication from the parents of another fatal case, that of a 27-month-old boy (A.J.B.) who expired under similar circumstances, i.e. due to a faulty estimate of the toxicity of fluoride.
After the child had swallowed an unknown number of fluoride tablets he was promptly taken, in an unconscious state, to a physician’s office where gastric lavage yielded 4 tablets. The physician advised the parents to take the still unconscious child home with the assurance that he needed no further treatment and that “he would be okay”. Three and a half hours later, when respiratory failure began to develop, the child was admitted to the Mater Misericordiae Children’s Hospital, South Brisbane, Australia, where he expired 5 days later (May 15, 1973). The death certificate #41182 of the Brisbane District, State of Queensland, carried the diagnosis “Fluoride Poisoning”. At the hospital the physicians and nurses also assured the parents that it would take “200 to 500 tablets to make him so sick”. Actually the bottle had contained less than 100 tablets.

Two factors may have contributed to this fatality: The mother, on the advice of the hospital, had been taking fluoride tablets during her pregnancy and the child, on the advice of the Welfare Clinic, had been given fluoride tablets (0.5 mg) daily for 15 months prior to his death. Both measures, combined, undoubtedly contributed to an excessive fluoride load in the child’s body and therefore to a lowered tolerance to additional doses.

Why do physicians fail to correctly evaluate the toxicity of fluoride? Most textbooks rely on the now outdated views of Smith and Hodge who 25 years ago designated 5 to 10 g of fluoride the fatal toxic dose (2).

Only recently (3) the Journal of the American Dental Association warned editorially against the use of fluoride supplements in infancy and early childhood presumably because of dental mottling. Unfortunately this editorial did not spell out clearly that doses of 0.5 mg or less can cause hemorrhages in the stomach (4), and bowels (5), atopic dermatitis (6), and other serious disabilities (7).

Similarly an editorial in the Journal of the American Medical Association (8) warned against the use of massive doses of fluoride in the treatment of osteoporosis but failed to indicate the potential harm of this medication. Therefore, neither editorial presents sufficient data to convince physicians and dentists that this drug is hazardous in doses formerly considered safe.

Administration of fluoride to pregnant women for prevention of tooth decay in the newborn has also been abandoned ostensibly because of its ineffectiveness (9). Unfortunately the danger of this treatment to the fetus and newborn is rarely mentioned in the available literature.

Moreover, many clinicians still adhere to the theory that the placenta forms an effective barrier which protects the fetus and newborn from damage by fluoride consumed by the mother. Teotia in this issue, page 58, shows that fluoride naturally in drinking water of pregnant women (21 and 1.5 mg/day) penetrates the placental barrier. Waldbott (10) showed that a newborn infant who expired shortly after birth with calcifications of arteries had stored 59.3 ppm fluoride in arteries, 5.85 in lungs, 2.86 in the thymus, 0.85 in kidneys, 0.81 in the heart. The mother’s main known source of fluoride intake had been artificially fluoridated water. Newborn calves exhibit evidence of dental fluorosis in an endemic area (this issue page 100). Thus there cannot be any doubt that toxic amounts of fluoride pass through the placenta.

All these facts point to the urgent need for a thorough reevaluation of all available data on the toxicity of fluoride. Life can be saved in poisoning from even larger doses than those generally considered toxic provided that prompt and efficient therapy is instituted (11). However, this can only be accomplished if physicians are made aware that fluoride must be used with extreme caution.

References:

1. Editorial. Toxicity of Fluoride. Fluoride, 11:163-165, 1978.

2. Hodge, H.C. and Smith, F.A.: Some Public Health Aspects of Water Fluoridation. In Fluoridation as a Public Health Measure, Shaw, J.H., (Ed.), A.A.A.S., 1954, p. 80.

3. Editorial. Concern about Dietary Fluoride Supplementation.J.A.D.A., 96:1158, 1978.

4. Waldbott, G.L., Burgstahler, A.W. and McKinney, H.L.: Fluoridation: The Great Dilemma. Coronado Press, Lawrence, Kansas, 1978, p. 359.

5. Shea, J.J., Gillespie, S.M. and Waldbott, G.L.: Allergy to Fluoride. Ann. Allergy, 25:388-391, 1967. http://www.fluoridealert.org/allergy.htm

6. Feltman, R. and Kosel, G.: Prenatal and Postnatal Ingestion of Fluorides – Fourteen Years of Investigation – Final Report. J. Dent. Med., 16:190-199, 1961.

7. Reference #4, pp. 110-126.

8. Editorial. Restraint in Use of High-Dose Fluorides to Treat Skeletal Disorders. J.A.M.A., 240:1630-1631, 1978.

9. Federal Register, Oct. 20, 1966, Vol. 31, No. 204.

10. Waldbott, G.L.: Hydrofluorosis in the U.S.A. Fluoride, 1:94-102, 1968.

11. Abukurah, A.R., Moser, A.M., Baird, C.L., Randall, R.E., et al. Acute Sodium Fluoride Poisoning. J. Am. Med. Assoc., 222:816-17, 1972.

2 comments:

  1. In todays world if someone wants to use fluoride, there are plenty of places to get what you want. It does not need to be in our town water. It should not be hidden from the public as it is in our Town of Templeton. If you are a new person on town water, how would you know what is added to your water ?? There is no information to inform residents that fluoride has been added to the water they use for drinking and cooking. I do not think that with holding this information is the right thing to do. It is my greatest fear that one day we will find out that this additive has caused more problems that we could ever imagine. I hope I am not right. Bev.

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  2. A good question to ask yourself if you have children in elementary school where fluoride treatments are recommended by our State Public Health Service is this: Why are fluoride treatments needed if our water fluoridation program is working? The rate of cavities has been shown to be no different in countries that don't fluoridate their water supply to those that do. Here is Michael Connett with ten facts about fluoride. FluorideFacts
    It is time we started to get this town off the enzymatic poison fluoride. Please support both citizen petitions at annual town meeting. Thank you.

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