Antifluoridation presentations "of the highest calibre"

Antifluoridation presentations "of the highest calibre"

The New Plymouth District Council has heard two full days of presentations on fluoridation, supporting some 4000 pages of written submissions. Around 90% were against fluoridation.

Opponents came from all walks of life. Wide-ranging academic credentials included dentistry, medicine, psychiatry, physiology, biophysics, chemical engineering, law, and chemistry. Fluoride Action Networks' National Co-ordinator, Mary Byrne, and Legal and Scientific Advisor, Mark Atkin, said "FANNZ" committee members have extensive expertise on this issue, yet even we heard scientific information that was completely new to us. And we were presented with a number of new perspectives we had not considered before. These presentations were of the highest calibre " absolutely outstanding!"

Anti-fluoridation speakers travelled from as far as Wellington, Hawke's Bay, Tauranga, Hamilton, Auckland, and Whangarei, all at their own expense.
By contrast, those advocating fluoridation were almost all in the dental profession, employed by the DHB or receiving government health funding, and spoke only about teeth. "We heard nothing but rhetoric, anecdote flavoured with blind belief, and repeated playing of the paternalistic race card. The only "science" I recall was the appallingly poor Wellington-Canterbury study of 2004. This is one of the worst studies on fluoridation in modern times. They had absolutely no rebuttal of the evidence on health damage from fluoride, which affects the whole body", advises Mr Atkin.

The DHB described fluoridation as "one of the four walls of the whare of oral public health strategy". An opponent noted that, based on the overwhelming evidence of harm presented, "smoke is pouring out of the windows, and inside the whare is firmly ablaze!"

Opponents? supporters filled most of the public gallery, and stayed for the full two days. Promoter?s supporters, mostly sporting DHB access cards, simply filed in for the DHB?s opening presentation, and left immediately afterwards. ?This is a pity?, says Ms Byrne. ?Had they stayed they would have heard more actual facts about fluoridation than they would have heard throughout their entire training and careers.?

Promoters claim that the unrefined contaminated toxic industrial waste fluoride used in fluoridation does not add any impurity to the water. They noted that although heavy metal contaminant levels were increased, they remained below the maximum limits. One also claimed that fluoridation is an obligation under the Treaty of Waitangi. A Maori presenter opposing fluoridation succinctly put the Maori perspective on dumping waste into pure water: If its tutai when it goes in, its tutai when it comes out!

This is by far the most compelling set of submissions against fluoridation we have ever seen presented to a Council. To vote for fluoridation after this one would have to have been genetically modified with ostrich DNA, and kept one?s head firmly in a bucket of sand for the two days? concludes Mr Atkin.

*For our international readers, tutai is Maori for excrement

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