Canada - Quebec - Fluoridation a blast from the past
Fluoridation a blast from the past
Fred Ryan, Citizen SpecialPublished: Thursday, May 08, 2008
When old-timers reminisce about the good old '50s, they talk about long cars with big fins and plenty of chrome, about Elvis and Buddy Holly, about college fads that seem out of touch today, panty raids, for example, and they talk about political battles ranging from cancelling the Avro Arrow jet to fluoridation.
Fifty years later fluoridation is a big issue in Gatineau, although Buddy Holly and the fins on a '56 Cadillac, are not. The government of Quebec, the one elected in 2007, has announced public-health measures which include fluoridating the water in 80 per cent of the province's major towns and cities. Quebecers were surprised to hear they weren't already getting fluorine in every glass of water.
Quebec hadn't signed on to fluoridation, but with 40-plus years of dental records to help them decide, the Ministry of Health is now ready. It was useful that Quebec hadn't agreed since this gave researchers a control group for studying the effects of fluoridation. The changes seem to be in fluoridation's favour. Ottawa's children today have 30 per cent fewer cavities than Gatineau's.
That single statistic, apparently, was what convinced Gatineau city council to embrace the provincial program. Opponents of the plan indicate that there are other differences between the two populations which have nothing to do with drinking water: Gatineau's higher youth obesity and its higher high-school drop-out rates. There may be other factors at play than a single cause, such as fluorine, say the opponents, who are, so far, largely individuals and residents' associations.
Residents' associations seem less concerned with the science of fluoridation than bothered by the surreptitious appearance of the project on city council's agenda, and the fact that council rubber-stamped the move without much discussion and certainly with no public consultation. Fluoridation amounts to a mass and indiscriminant medication of the population. As soon as the associations' representatives began talking that way, red flags flew up everywhere. Letters to the editor, call-in shows, and calls to councillors all increased. The Outaouais health board launched a public education campaign. The local health board had apparently heard from other regions in Quebec that similar resistance was growing elsewhere.
The individuals who are writing to their newspapers are concerned with the health effects of too much fluorine. The Internet has made everyone an authority, and this is not a bad thing. These opponents point out that in the '50s, fluoridation was novel. Its beneficial results were soon apparent, as cavity rates fell. But as those beneficial results became widely known, they prompted the introduction of fluorine into many other products, toothpaste in particular; and because most water now contained fluorine, food products containing water also contain fluorine.
Scientists were able to measure fluorine in hot dogs, juices, and soft drinks, for starters. Kids eating hot dogs and sodas, plus drinking water and brushing their teeth, were now getting substantially more fluorine than the original microscopic amount doled out in the water supply. And this is the ratepayers' problem. Fluorine in tiny amounts is helpful; in larger amounts, it causes fluorosis, a discolouration of the teeth. Researchers thought it might also result in malformed teeth and softer enamel; other researchers saw links between high fluorine levels and developmental problems in young males......continued.
Click on title to seee second half
Fred Ryan, Citizen SpecialPublished: Thursday, May 08, 2008
When old-timers reminisce about the good old '50s, they talk about long cars with big fins and plenty of chrome, about Elvis and Buddy Holly, about college fads that seem out of touch today, panty raids, for example, and they talk about political battles ranging from cancelling the Avro Arrow jet to fluoridation.
Fifty years later fluoridation is a big issue in Gatineau, although Buddy Holly and the fins on a '56 Cadillac, are not. The government of Quebec, the one elected in 2007, has announced public-health measures which include fluoridating the water in 80 per cent of the province's major towns and cities. Quebecers were surprised to hear they weren't already getting fluorine in every glass of water.
Quebec hadn't signed on to fluoridation, but with 40-plus years of dental records to help them decide, the Ministry of Health is now ready. It was useful that Quebec hadn't agreed since this gave researchers a control group for studying the effects of fluoridation. The changes seem to be in fluoridation's favour. Ottawa's children today have 30 per cent fewer cavities than Gatineau's.
That single statistic, apparently, was what convinced Gatineau city council to embrace the provincial program. Opponents of the plan indicate that there are other differences between the two populations which have nothing to do with drinking water: Gatineau's higher youth obesity and its higher high-school drop-out rates. There may be other factors at play than a single cause, such as fluorine, say the opponents, who are, so far, largely individuals and residents' associations.
Residents' associations seem less concerned with the science of fluoridation than bothered by the surreptitious appearance of the project on city council's agenda, and the fact that council rubber-stamped the move without much discussion and certainly with no public consultation. Fluoridation amounts to a mass and indiscriminant medication of the population. As soon as the associations' representatives began talking that way, red flags flew up everywhere. Letters to the editor, call-in shows, and calls to councillors all increased. The Outaouais health board launched a public education campaign. The local health board had apparently heard from other regions in Quebec that similar resistance was growing elsewhere.
The individuals who are writing to their newspapers are concerned with the health effects of too much fluorine. The Internet has made everyone an authority, and this is not a bad thing. These opponents point out that in the '50s, fluoridation was novel. Its beneficial results were soon apparent, as cavity rates fell. But as those beneficial results became widely known, they prompted the introduction of fluorine into many other products, toothpaste in particular; and because most water now contained fluorine, food products containing water also contain fluorine.
Scientists were able to measure fluorine in hot dogs, juices, and soft drinks, for starters. Kids eating hot dogs and sodas, plus drinking water and brushing their teeth, were now getting substantially more fluorine than the original microscopic amount doled out in the water supply. And this is the ratepayers' problem. Fluorine in tiny amounts is helpful; in larger amounts, it causes fluorosis, a discolouration of the teeth. Researchers thought it might also result in malformed teeth and softer enamel; other researchers saw links between high fluorine levels and developmental problems in young males......continued.
Click on title to seee second half
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