Doctors Joseph Mercola and Bill Osmunson discuss the public health effects of fluoride

Fluoride makes populations submissive

(Mind Trek) Valdamar Valerian, July 20, 1996

… At the end of the World War II, the United States Government sent Charles E. Perkins, a research worker in chemistry, biochemistry, physiology and pathology, to take charge of the vast I.G. Farben chemical plants in Germany [ 34 ]. While there, Perkins was told by German chemists of a scheme which had been worked out by them during the war and adopted by the German General Staff, which was to control the population in any given area through mass medication of drinking water [ 35 ]. In this scheme, sodium fluoride occupied a prominent place. Repeated doses of infinitesmal amounts of fluoride will in time reduce an indivdual’s power to resist domination by slowly poisoning and narcotising a certain area of the brain, and will make him submissive to the will of those who wish to govern him [ 36 ]. The social effect was that it made it more difficult for a person to defend his freedom. Both the Germans and Soviets (1940) added sodium fluoride to the drinking water of prisoners of war to make them stupid and docile [ 37 ]. It is also a well known fact among breeders of purebred bulls that the administration of fluorides makes the bull more submissive and easier to handle [ 38 ].

According to Senator Ambruster in his magnificent tome Treason’s Peace – German Dyes and American Dupes (1947), one of the largest producers of fluorides as a hazardous waste by-product was the Aluminium Company of America (ALCOA), who had a 1931 agreement with I.G. Farben in Germany, as did Dow Chemical Company (1933) to restrict American production of materials vital to the U.S. war effort. Other companies such as Imperial Chemical Industries (ICI, England), DuPont, Standard Oil (Rockefeller, who contributed war materials and money to Hitler), American Cyanamid and Sterling-Winthrop-Bayer were Farben associates. Indictments were filed against several of these companies on January 30, 1941, covering conspiracy, but inside forces spent so much effort at softening up the Justice Department (which is still corrupt today) to prevent prosecution that by April 15, 1942, all the defendants pleaded nolo contendre (“oh, well, what if we did?”) and paid fines of $25,000 each. It is also a fact that I.G. Farben itself was indicted, but the case never came to court. Some of Farben’s leading subsidiaries in the U.S. were General Aniline and Film (GAF), American I.G., and Bayer, but it was their associate ALCOA which figured prominently in the introduction of fluoride wastes from aluminum production (difficult of dispose of), quickly joined by LCI (Florida) and other fertilizer industries who had fluoride by-products classified by the EPA as hazardous waste [ 39 ].

According to scientist Charles Perkins, in a 1954 letter to the Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research, Milwaukee, Wisconsin:

“We are told by the fanatical ideologists who are advocating the fluoridation of the water supplies in this country that their purpose is to reduce the incidence of tooth decay in children, and it is the plausibility of this excuse, plus the gullability of the public and the cupidity of public officials that this is responsible for the present spread of artificial water fluoridation in this country. However, and I want to make this very definite and very positive: the real reason behind water fluoridation is not to benefit children’s teeth. If this were the real reason, there are many ways in which it could be done that are much easier, cheaper and far more effective. The real purpose behind water fluoridation is to reduce the resistance of the masses to domination, control and loss of liberty. When the Nazis decided to go into Poland, the German General Staff and the Russian General Staff exchanged scientific and military ideas, plans and personnel, and also the sheme of mass control through water medication was seized upon by the Russian Communists because it fitted ideally into their plan to Communize the world. I say this with all earnestness and sincerity of a scientist who has spend nearly 20 years research into the chemistry, biochemistry, physiology and pathology of fluorine — any person who drinks artificially fluoridated water for a period of one year or more will never again be the same person, mentally or physically.” [ 40 ]

[Unfortunately, the ctations are unavailable. Please post a commnet if you can locate them.]

See also: A Chronology of Fluoridation [pdf]

Central Nervous System Damage from Fluorides

by Phyllis J. Mullenix, Ph.D. September 14, 1998

It was 1982 when fluoride was first brought to my attention as a substance in need of investigation. At that time, I was in the Departments of Psychiatry at Boston’s Children’s Hospital and Neuropathology at the Harvard Medical School. My studies focused on detection procedures for neurotoxicity, and they typically considered a variety of environmental and therapeutic agents, i.e., radiation, lead, amphetamine, phenytoin, nitrous oxide. Dr. John Hein, then Director of Forsyth’s Dental Infirmary for Children in Boston, was interested in neurotoxicity studies and invited me to continue this research at Forsyth and to apply it to substances used in dentistry. Fluoride was prominent on his list.

Five years lapsed before our investigations of fluoride began. The delay was due to time spent on technological improvements, specifically development of a computer pattern recognition system for the objective quantification of behavior in an animal model. In early June of 1986, the Forsyth Dental Center was noted for this achievement in the Wall Street Journal and the Boston Herald, and applications of our research grew. The new technology enabled us to study the clinically recognized neurotoxicity associated with the treatment for childhood leukemia. Simultaneously, we started investigations of fluoride, the “safe and effective” treatment for dental caries.

Initially, the fluoride study sparked little interest, and in fact we were quite anxious to move on to something academically more exciting. Using an animal model developed for the study of dental fluorosis, we expected rats drinking fluoride-treated water would behave the same as matching controls. They did not. The scientific literature led us to believe that rats would easily tolerate 175 ppm fluoride in their drinking water. They did not. Reports in the literature indicated that fluoride would not cross the blood brain barrier. But it did. Prenatal exposure to fluoride was not supposed to permanently alter behavioral outcome. It did. Like walking into quicksand, our confidence that brain function was impervious to fluoride was sinking.

Our 1995 paper in Neurotoxicology and Teratology was the first laboratory study to demonstrate in vivo that central nervous system (CNS) function was vulnerable to fluoride, that the effects on behavior depended on the age at exposure and that fluoride accumulated in brain tissues. The behavioral changes common to weanling and adult exposures were different from those after prenatal exposure. Whereas prenatal exposure dispersed many behaviors as seen in drug-induced hyperactivity, weanling and adult exposures led to behavior- specific changes more related to cognitive deficits. Brain histology was not examined in this study, but we suggested that the effects on behavior were consistent with interrupted hippocampal development (a brain region generally linked with memory).

Establishing a threshold dose for effects on the CNS, in rats or humans, was not the intent of this initial investigation. Yet, one fact relevant to human exposure emerged quite clear. When rats consumed 75-125 ppm and humans 5-10 ppm fluoride in their respective drinking waters, the result was equivalent ranges of plasma fluoride levels. This range is observed with some treatments for osteoporosis, and it is exceeded ten times over, one hour after children receive topical applications of some dental fluoride gels. Thus, humans are being exposed to levels of fluoride we know alters behavior in rats.

We concluded that the rat study flagged potential for motor dysfunction, IQ deficits and/or learning disabilities in humans. Confident as we were, the data were only one piece of the puzzle, the overall picture was still emerging. Soon thereafter we learned of two epidemiological studies (Fluoride, 1995-1996) from China showing IQ deficits in children over-exposed to fluoride via drinking water or soot from burning coal. A recent review (International Clinical Psychopharmacology, 1994) listed case reports of CNS effects in humans excessively exposed to fluoride, information that spans almost 60 years. A common theme appeared in the reported effects: impaired memory and concentration, lethargy, headache, depression and confusion. The same theme was echoed in once classified reports about workers from the Manhatten Project. In all, our rat data seem to fit a consistent picture.

Information linking fluoride and CNS dysfunction continues in 1998.

1) A recent study in Brain Research demonstrated that chronic exposure to fluoride in drinking water of rats compromised neuronal (hippocampal) and cerebrovascular integrity (blood brain barrier) and increased aluminum concentrations in brain tissues.
2) Masters and Coplan have reported (International Journal of Environmental Studies, in press) that silicofluorides in fluoridated drinking water increased levels of lead in children’s blood, a risk factor that predicts higher crime rates, ADD and learning disabilities.
3) Luke at the International Society for Fluoride Research (ISFR) meeting in August reported that fluoride accumulated in the human pineal gland, as much or more so than in bones and teeth, and the pineal gland’s melatonin biosynthesis pathway is affected by fluoride.
4) Also at the ISFR meeting, I reported that the fluorinated steroid (dexamethasone) disrupts behavior in rats to a greater degree than does the nonfluorinated steroid (prednisolone). This finding matched results just completed in a study of children receiving steroids as a part of their treatment for childhood leukemia. Dexamethasone, compared to prednisolone, further reduced IQ, specifically impairing reading comprehension, arithmetic calculation and short-term working memory.

Exposure to fluoride goes well beyond that in our drinking water, toothpastes and mouth rinses. Fluoridation of water dictates that it is in food and processed beverages. Pesticides such as cryolite also increase fluoride content of foods. The trend toward fluorinating pharmaceuticals increases fluoride exposure via medication. Fluoride, in various compounds, plays a heavy role in occupational exposures and for people living in close proximity to industry, i.e., aluminum, steel, brick, glass, petroleum, etc. With exposure so common, we can no longer afford to ignore potential CNS consequences of fluoride.

Phyllis J. Mullenix, Ph.D.