Open letter to Labour's David Shearer

Open Letter to David Shearer from Fluoride Free New Zealand
25th July 2014

Fluoride Free NZ is surprised to hear you refer to those of us who take an active concern of clean pure drinking water as parasites. We find your comments baseless and insulting to the majority of international scientists and world governments, who have rejected fluoridation as ineffective, unsafe, and unethical. It also seems a rather foolish thing to call a large number of NZers in the lead up to a national election given half of the country is not fluoridated.

As you are not aware of all the facts you may not realise that many towns have ceased fluoridation. Since 1985 fluoridation has stopped in Timaru, Gore, Bluff, Tauranga, Matamata, Kaitaia, Ashburton, Taumarunui, New Plymouth, Waipukurau and Hamilton (Hamilton have now restarted). Again we are surprised that you choose to insult the people in these towns and communities who oppose fluoridation.

You say that you have reviewed the latest information on fluoridation but you obviously haven’t. What you appear to have done is review the latest endorsements. This is far different than reviewing the evidence for yourself. The York Review did this and found no proof of benefit to the poor. The US National Research Council Review raised serious concerns about health safety. A meta-analysis published in the Lancet, the world’s oldest and most prestigious medical journal in 2012, found that fluoride reduced IQ in children.

Please explain what evidence you have reviewed that proves New Zealand children are not being exposed to the same dose. Please explain what evidence you have that the arthritis suffered by hundreds of thousands of older New Zealanders, as an accepted effect of fluoride by WHO, or the low thyroid function suffered by hundreds of thousands of others, is not the result of chronic exposure to low dose fluoride poisoning.

And what real evidence do you have that fluoridation actually works? Official Information Act request regarding the effect of ending fluoridation in Ashburton, the evidence shows that dental health has continued to improve in Ashburton despite fluoridation ending in 2002 and not the increase the Ministry of Health (MOH) declared would happen. In fact there has been a steady improvement in dental health in all places that have stopped fluoridation in New Zealand.

In contrast fluoridation has been proven to increase the prevalence of dental fluorosis in areas that are fluoridated. NZ studies show fluoridated areas have twice as much dental fluorosis as non-fluoridated areas (30% compared to 15% of children). Dental fluorosis is the first outward sign of fluoride poisoning. Our children in fluoridated areas are receiving too much fluoride. It gets worse, no safety studies have ever been conducted on industrial fluoride chemicals added to water supplies anywhere in the world.

So David, you say that another review of fluoridation is not required and we agree - we need to end fluoridation immediately.

ENDS

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